The South African rand remained range bound against the US dollar in late afternoon trade on Thursday, despite the news that China had revalued the yuan.

At 15:56 (1356 GMT), the rand was bid at 6.5745 per dollar from an overnight close of 6.5728.

It was bid at 7.9952 to the euro from a previous 7.9873 and at 11.4608 against sterling from Wednesday's 11.4130.

The euro jumped above 1.22 per dollar after the yuan announcement, which saw the rand given at 6.51, said an I-Net Bridge report.

However, after the brief spike on the euro, local demand took the rand back to where it was before the China news, said a currency trader.

He added that the rand was likely to take direction from the euro for the rest of the day.

China's central bank on Thursday announced its currency, the RMB yuan, will be traded at a rate of 8.11 to the US dollar starting 11:00 GMT Thursday, and the yuan to US dollar pegging system is switched to a basket of foreign currencies.

The I-Net Bridge report said the move allowed the yuan to gain some 8 percent against the dollar, with many of Asia's currencies tugged higher as a result of trade relationships.

China's decade-long dollar peg put its currency most recently at 8.27 yuan per dollar.

Source: Xinhua