Gold miners led the JSE 2.5% higher yesterday as the price of gold continued its rise above $2,000 an ounce. Gold Fields and DRDGOLD were also buoyed by positive updates as they guided investors to expect bumper earnings for the period to end-June, despite disruptions as a result of Covid-19 lockdowns.

Sasol had a strong day, too, as the price of Brent crude oil gained close to 2%. The oil and chemicals group is the topic of Ingham Analytics latest Searchlight report, "Going, going for a song", which advises investors to tread carefully due to the possibility of a rights issue. You can find more detail down below.

Meanwhile, JSE Limited, operator of the stock and bond exchange, has benefitted from increased market volatility this year, posting a strong rise in first-half earnings. No such luck for packaging group Mpact, which reported lower earnings due to reduced demand for its products. Liberty Holdings swung to an interim loss after setting billions of rand aside as a precaution due to Covid-19.

Also today, DealMakers rounds up the merger and acquisition action for the first half of the year, with deals worth R134 billion by listed companies. Property deals accounted for one third of the M&A activity as the listed sector navigates its worst year to date, with disposals reflecting the challenges facing commercial real estate.

I hope you have a good day.

Stephen Gunnion

Managing Editor, InceConnect

The latest from Ingham Analytics

Sasol is in the spotlight. In "Going, going for a song" Ingham Analytics say that if Sasol management keep flogging the shareholders' silver as they're attempting to do with the potential sale of sixteen air separation units located in Secunda to Air Liquide, they'll have to consider a rights issue after all. They quantify what the replacement cost is of the ASU's and the impact of a $2 billion rights issue. Air Liquide has a return on capital employed of 8.6% say Ingham Analytics so there will be some assumption of at least a cost of capital return, including maintenance and future replacement.