The Monthly Review
Signals rarely shout. Noise usually does. A read on the month beneath the headlines: the conversation we have been having internally.
The month South Africa led the world
The best return of the nine came with the only rise in volatility.
The MSCI ACWI returned 2.7% in August in local currency. The index that led it was the JSE All Share at 4.6%, ahead of the NASDAQ at 4.0% and the Nikkei 225 at 3.1%.
Gold did the work. It rose 9.67% to $4,437.38 an ounce, copper closed at a record on the London Metal Exchange on 25 August, and the rand ended the month 2.51% stronger.
Month-end close to month-end close. A fall in USDZAR means a stronger rand. Source: Bloomberg, as at 31 August 2026.
Risk went the other way. Thirty-day volatility fell in eight of the nine indices and credit spreads tightened to their narrowest since January. South Africa was the exception on both counts.
A narrower table, with a new name at the top
Five and a half points separated best from worst, against twenty-one and a half in July. Only two indices fell: the Swiss Market at −0.4% and the Hang Seng at −1.0%.
The year reads differently. The Nikkei leads at 29.1%, while the two indices that led August sit at the bottom of it. August turned the JSE’s calendar year positive for the first time in 2026.
Total returns in local currency, which removes currency-translation effects but is not directly comparable with older figures reported in US dollars. Source: Bloomberg, as at 31 August 2026.
Volatility drained out of everywhere but here
The Nikkei 225 fell furthest, from 35.6 to 23.8, unwinding July’s carry-trade turbulence. The FTSE 100 more than halved. The JSE went the other way, from 12.7 to 19.0.
Ordered by change over the month, largest fall first. Hover any pair for the change in points. Source: Bloomberg, end-July and end-August 2026.
The JSE is now the only one of the nine whose 30-day volatility sits above its own 90-day reading, at 19.0 against 16.6. Everywhere else the near-term number is the lower of the two, which is what a market cooling off looks like.
Our reading, rather than a finding in the data, is that the volatility rose because of what led the index, not in spite of it. A 9.67% move in gold cannot lift the JSE without widening its daily range.
It would mean something quite different if it were still there once the metals stop moving.
Prepared beats predicted.
Carried by what we dig up
The JSE returned 4.6% in August, and is up 2.7% for the year and 18.3% over twelve months. Materials led every other sector by a wide margin, with communications and energy the laggards.
We publish that as direction only. The sector figures available to us are unweighted member averages that do not reconcile to the index return, and a number that does not reconcile is worse than no number at all.
Year-on-year rates, released during August 2026 for the reference periods shown. Source: Bloomberg economic calendar; Statistics South Africa.
Two releases sit outside that chart, and both matter. Second-quarter unemployment printed at 33.6%, a four-year high and a full point above consensus, while the July trade surplus came in at R20.1 billion against R15.0 billion expected.
The rand travelled a 4.6% range and ended 2.51% stronger at 16.1150. It touched 16.6367 on 3 August, then a six-month high of 15.9002 on 26 August, helped by gold, easing Fed expectations and a bond auction covered nearly six times.
The Reserve Bank did not meet in August. The repo rate has stood at 7.00% since the July hold.
One point is contested and we would not settle it: whether the core inflation uptick to 4.2% signals cost pass-through that keeps an increase live later in 2026, or whether the headline fall to 4.3% closes the case.
Separately, JIBAR ends on 31 December 2026. That will show up in hedging costs before it shows up in returns.
Signals beneath the noise
Signals rarely shout. Noise usually does.
Credit
US five-year CDS narrowed from 70.5 to 66.7 and European CDS from 55.7 to 53.9, the narrowest for both since January 2026.
The European reading is the third-lowest since the series begins in April 2021, in a month holding a live conflict in the Strait of Hormuz and a hawkish Jackson Hole.
Volatility
The Nikkei 225 is still the most volatile index on both horizons, at 23.8 and 33.5, even after the largest fall of the month. The FTSE 100 is the calmest, at 5.0 and 9.1.
Hover any point to see its July position and 30-day move. Source: Bloomberg, end-July and end-August 2026.
Rates and policy
None of the five central banks we track met in August. All five meet inside a fortnight in September.
Rates as at 31 August 2026; the Federal Reserve figure is the upper bound of its target range. Each meeting date confirmed against that bank’s own calendar. Source: SARB, Federal Reserve, Bank of England, ECB, Bank of Japan.
The month’s policy content came from Jackson Hole, where Fed Chair Warsh called the 2% PCE target “firm and fixed” and said financial conditions are not restrictive.
US inflation for July was 3.4% year on year, with core at 2.5%, matching the slowest core pace since March 2021.
Whether the Fed itself moves in September is contested. Swaps leaned toward an increase after Warsh spoke, while bond investors at ABN AMRO and Brandywine were publicly sceptical, and we would not present either as settled.
The questions we are sitting with into September
Two months of deferred decisions
Nothing met in August and everything meets in September. The signalling from four of the five points at increases rather than cuts.
Whether SA volatility outlives the metals
The JSE is the only index of the nine running above its own 90-day reading. If that persists once gold and copper settle, it is telling us something other than a good month.
Food into the CPI
The Bloomberg Agriculture Spot Index rose more than 13% in August, its steepest month since July 2012. The Reserve Bank has named food and fuel as what it is watching.
Hormuz, unresolved
Brent ended flat at +0.4%, having spent the month roughly between $87 and $91. A US strike on Larak Island on 30 August left the price above $89 and the conflict open.
The tariff calendar into the summit
Drone export controls, 100% US drone tariffs, fresh sanctions over Iran, and reports of a 7.5% overcapacity tariff ahead of an expected Xi-Trump meeting. The Hang Seng carried all of it as the month’s weakest index.
Curiosity is a surprisingly effective risk management tool.