\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Business confidence fell by 3.3 index points in September, the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Sacci) said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Business Confidence Index retreated by 3.3 index points from 95 in August 2012 to 91.7 in September 2012,\u201d said Sacci as it released its monthly BCI.<\/p>\n
In the first quarter of 2012, the BCI declined by 0.6 index points. It had declined by 2.6 points in the second quarter and in the third quarter by 1.5 points, leading to a total loss of 4.7 points since the beginning of the year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith the BCI at 100 in 2010, the 91.7 in September 2012 remains a depressed level for local confidence,\u201d noted Sacci.<\/p>\n
In September 2012, the BCI was 6.7 points below its level in September 2011 with recent developments in the domestic market weighing on the BCI, said Sacci alluding to recent strikes in the country.<\/p>\n
Both the financial and real economic sub-indices fared worse in September compared to the previous month. On an annual (year-on-year) basis, 11 of the 13 sub-indices declined in September 2012 and only two were positive.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a dramatic turnaround on the situation in August 2012, when nine sub-indices made a positive contribution to the business climate,\u201d said Sacci.<\/p>\n
Sacci further expressed concern at the recent downgrade of South African government bonds by Moody\u2019s and South Africa\u2019s loss of two positions in the 2012\/2013 WEF competitiveness rankings to 52 from 50 out of 144 countries. <\/p>\n
\u201cSouth Africa\u2019s worst performing competitiveness areas are health, primary education and labour markets. Financial markets and market size is where South Africa\u2019s competitiveness strength lies,\u201d said Sacci.<\/p>\n
Government had taken note of the downgrade. Diminishing government institutional strength, reduced fiscal space, increased concerns about future political stability and relatively high labour costs despite high unemployment were some of the reasons given by Moody\u2019s for the downgrade.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reasons given by the rating agency for the downgrade are currently being addressed through various government programmes,\u201d said government last week. -SAnews.gov.za<\/p>\n
\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Business confidence fell by 3.3 index points in September, the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Sacci) said on Wednesday. \u201cThe Business Confidence Index retreated by 3.3 index points from 95 in August 2012 to 91.7 in September 2012,\u201d said Sacci as it released its monthly BCI. In the first quarter of 2012, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[1289,5],"class_list":{"0":"post-15192","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-mype","8":"tag-port-elizabeth-2","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15192\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}