JOHANNESBURG, June 27 (Reuters) - The South African rand was slightly up on Friday after sharp falls a day earlier, shrugging off a dispute between President Cyril Ramaphosa and his main coalition partner.
The currency was 0.4% higher against the dollar at 17.8075 at 1424 GMT, a day after Ramaphosa, of the African National Congress (ANC), fired the deputy trade minister, from the Democratic Alliance (DA).
Ramaphosa said on Friday that he expected the DA to propose a replacement for outgoing deputy trade minister Andrew Whitfield. The DA has called a press conference for Saturday to say what it will do next.
Commerzbank analyst Volkmar Baur said in a research note that this tension going into the weekend could weigh heavily on the local currency.
But the rand strengthened against a weak dollar , which was trading near its lowest level in more than three years compared with a basket of currencies.
On Monday, investor attention will be on May credit extension and money supply data trade balance and budget balance data for the same month.
The Johannesburg Stock Exchange's Top-40 index last traded down 0.3%.
South Africa's benchmark 2035 government bond was down, as the yield rose 3 basis points to 9.985%.
Reporting by Sfundo Parakozov and Alessandro Parodi; Editing by Andrew Heavens, William Maclean
Source: Reuters