South Africa Leading Economic Index

Last Release

Oct 31, 2025

Actual

0.4

Units In

-1.2

Frequency

Monthly

Next Release

Jan 27, 2026

Time to Release

1 Months 8 Days 9 Hours

Highest	Lowest	Average	Date Range	Source
4.8 Jun 2020	-6.8 Apr 2020	0.19 %	1960-2025	South African Reserve Bank

In South Africa, the Composite Leading Business Cycle Indicator examines the direction in which real economic activity is moving, in real time. It is calculated on the basis of the following components: building plans approved, new passenger vehicles sold, commodity price index for main export commodities, index of prices of all classes of shares traded on the JSE, job advertisements, volume of orders in manufacturing, real M1, average hours worked per factory worker in manufacturing, interest rate spread, composite leading business cycle indicator of the major trading-partner countries, business confidence index, gross operating surplus as a percentage of GDP. The index has a base value of 100 as of 2010.

Latest Updates

The composite leading business cycle indicator in Africa rose by 0.4% month-on-month in October 2025, rebounding from a 1.2% fall in September, as increases in six of the ten available component time series outweighed the decreases in the remaining four. The largest positive contributions came from an increase in South Africa’s US-dollar-denominated export commodity price index and the improvement in the RMB/BER business confidence index. In contrast, the main negative contributors were a slowdown in the six-month smoothed growth rate of real M1 money supply and a narrowing of the interest rate spread. Meanwhile, the composite coincident indicator edged up 0.1% in September, unchanged from the previous month, supported by gains in the industrial production index and employment in the formal non-agricultural sector. At the same time, the lagging indicator increased 0.8% in September.