The governor
(Tito Mboweni) said: "I am concerned that our current account deficit is more than 6% (of GDP) ... when the rule of thumb (says it) should be around 3%."
"What it means in practice is we are consuming far more than we are producing... we are importing more," he said.
Noting that the Australian central bank governor had asked him why he was worried about it - as Australia and New Zealand had larger current account deficits - he said there was a "big difference" between South Africa and Australia.
Australia attracted large amounts of foreign direct investment and it was not just made up of portfolio flows: it was "real bricks and mortar".
As a consequence, Australia had been able to sustain a relatively large current account deficit.
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