Stocks were lower on the day with Barclays Africa unit falling after the company said it had approval to sell off its stake in the locally listed entity.
The rand weakened 0.4% to 13.1875 per dollar, sliding back from a brief run to a session best 13.0600 as a third consecutive trade surplus, albeit smaller than expected, failed to lift the cloud of political uncertainty.
"The short term outlook for the rand remains unfavourable as long as political noise continues to dominate headlines and drive pessimism," said economist at ETM analytics Halen Bothma.
The unit retreated from last week's 2-month high after President Jacob Zuma over the weekend survived a second attempt in six months by members of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) to unseat him as leader. It has been on the backfoot since.
