South Africa Leading Economic Index

Last Release

May 31, 2025

Actual

-1.3

Units In

-0.3

Frequency

Monthly

Next Release

Aug 26, 2025

Time to Release

1 Months 2 Days 6 Hours

Highest	Lowest	Average	Date Range	Source
4.8 Jun 2020	-6.8 Apr 2020	0.18 %	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 South Africa decreased by 1.3% month-over-month in May 2025, following an upwardly revised 0.6% fall in the previous month. This marked the second consecutive monthly decline, reflecting downturns in nine of the ten available component time series. The largest negative contributors were decreases in the number of residential building plans approved and the volume of domestic orders received in the manufacturing sector. The only positive contribution came from an increase in South Africa’s US dollar–denominated export commodity price index.