Despite a firmer opening on Wall Street, South African stocks closed lower on Friday weighed heavily by metal stocks which were impacted by movements in the dollar.

The local bourse spent the entire session in negative territory after being dragged lower by world markets in the wake of a weaker close in the Dow on Thursday.

By 5pm the all share index had shed 3.39 percent, with resources falling 4.12 percent, gold miners giving up 6.18 percent. However, platinum stocks added 1.37 percent. Banks were down 6.57 percent, financials gave up 3.58 percent and industrials weakened 2.46 percent.

The rand was last bid at 9.74 to the dollar from 9.78 when the JSE closed on Thursday, while gold was last quoted at $838.82 a troy ounce from $854.28 at the JSE's last close.

The platinum price was at $849.50/oz from its previous close of $854.50 and Brent crude was at $44.39 per barrel from $43.36 before.

"We closed sharply weaker, all the sectors were hit hard today," a trader said.

"Movements in the dollar have continued to put metal prices under pressure," he said.

"There is also some position squaring ahead of the weekend and the holiday break as people take time off and will only be back next year," he pointed out.

The trader said the rand, which had weakened slightly since this morning's levels on the back of a rebounding dollar, had not offered any support for the market.

Dow Jones Newswires reports that US stocks opened higher.

The DJIA was last up 1.11 percent.

On the JSE, Anglo American was down 8.51 percent to 215 rand and BHP Billiton gave up 2.44 percent to 179.88 rand.

Petrochemicals group Sasol lost 3.30 percent to 275.50 rand.

Kumba Iron Ore was up 2.02 percent to 166.80 rand and ArcelorMittal added 4.79 percent to 85.40 rand, but Highveld Steel was down 1.27 percent to 56 rand.

Gold miner AngloGold Ashanti weakened 3.12 percent to 240.50 rand, Gold Fields was down 7.73 percent to 80.20 rand and Harmony shed 11.09 percent to 84.46 rand.

Platinum miner Anglo Platinum added 1.96 percent to 520 rand, Impala Platinum was up 1.25 rand to 131.25 rand and Lonmin collected 6.02 percent to 119.80 rand.

Among diversified miners, African Rainbow gained 1.15 percent to 108.23 rand but Exxaro shed 1.79 percent to 68.75 rand.

Zambia Copper Investments was unchanged at 9.90 rand. The group announced earlier that its headline earnings per share were expected to be between 92 percent and 97 percent lower in the six-month period to end September 2008.

Among industrials, SABMiller was down 4.16 percent to 169.46 rand, Famous Brands shed three percent, to 14.55 rand and Tiger Brands gave up 2.18 percent to 145.75 rand but Barloworld was up 4.45 percent to 42.94 rand.

Imperial weakened 4.76 percent to 60 rand. Moody's Investors Service on Thursday downgraded the long-term issuer rating of Imperial Group (Pty) Ltd to Baa3 from Baa2 and maintained its negative outlook. Moody's also downgraded other related global scale debt ratings of Imperial, also with a negative outlook.

Among banks, Standard Bank gave up 7.40 percent to 83.80 rand, Nedbank shed or 2.93 percent to 95.13 rand, Absa lost 4.74 percent to 108.60 rand and FirstRand weakened 6.21 percent to 15.85 rand.

Financial services group RMB Holdings lost 9.84 percent to 24.11 rand, while Old Mutual was up 5.09 percent to 7.85 rand.

Retailer JD Group lost 6.34 percent to 33.25 rand and Spar was off 2.18 rand, or 3.88 percent, to 54 rand.

Construction group Aveng weakened 3.94 percent to 28.05 rand and Murray & Roberts gave up 4.79 percent to 45.10 rand but Group Five added 1.89 percent to 36.17 rand.

Among telecommunications groups MTN Group shed 6.21 percent to 99 rand but Telkom firmed 3.32 percent to 112.10 rand.

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