South Africa's rand steadied against the dollar on Friday, giving up earlier gains as investors moved to safer assets while the local stock market ticked up. Government bonds lost some steam after heavy gains this week that were prompted by increased hopes for another interest cut to add to 5.5 percentage points worth of reductions since December 2008. The rand was trading at 7.32 against the dollar at 1530 GMT, not far from Thursday's New York close of 7.3098. It firmed to 7.2290 earlier, but came back in late Johannesburg trade. "The rand has weakened (since the morning) and the main reason is the euro that's come down sharply. If the euro weakens further it will put pressure on the rand although the rand holding up pretty well," said a Johannesburg based trader. The euro, currency of South Africa's major trading partner, hit a new three-week low to the dollar, as investors preferred the safer greenback on renewed concerns about the global economic outlook. The rand has retreated since hitting a 2-1/2 year high of 7.1740 on Monday, with the next key level at 7.35/dollar. The Johannesburg JSE blue-chip Top-40 index added 0.2 percent to 24,424.34 points but still booked its third straight weekly loss. The broader All-share index was up 0.22 percent at 27,526.23 points. "We're in oversold territory," said Michele Santangelo, a trader at NEWS Trading. "We also had the German GDP data earlier and that helped us stay in the black." Charts suggest the Top-40 index was due for rebound with one of its momentum gauge, slow stochastic, well below the oversold 20 mark. Analysts who look at this momentum gauge consider a level below 20 as oversold and about 70 as overbought. Among equity movers on the exchange, Exxaro rallied 2.62 percent to 117.50 rand, a day after posting nearly 70 percent surge in half-year profit. MTN Group was up 1.63 percent at 116.50 rand ahead its half-year results next week in which it is expected to declare a hefty dividend. Standard Bank was among the stocks that restricted gains on the index, dropping 3.22 percent to 103.50 rand in what traders said was due to a broker downgrade. Gold miners also dipped as the price bullion faltered with Gold Fields falling 1.92 percent to 102.23 rand and Harmony retreating 1.87 percent to 78.90 rand. Bonds weakened, with the yield on the 2015 issue up 4 basis points to 7.465 percent and that on the 2036 note up 5.5 basis points to 8.33 percent. Focus next week will be on retail sales data on Wednesday, which will give further clues on whether the central bank could cut the repo rate further from the current 6.5 percent.

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