By Adelaide Changole, Bloomberg.
Headline earnings climbed 30% to R13.7 billion in the year to 28 February from R10.6 billion a year earlier. That compared with the median estimate of R13.8 billion, according to eight analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
The company proposed a final dividend of R44.25 per share, bringing the total payout to R65.1 a share and surpassing a consensus estimate of R60.74 apiece.
Under outgoing chief executive officer Gerrie Fourie, the lender has seen profit increase to a record for four straight years as the company’s focus on low-income depositors and unsecured lending paid off. His successor, Graham Lee, will have to confront intensifying competition as rivals including Nedbank Group and new lender OM Bank seek to tap the low-income market.
The lender has set up a special-purpose vehicle by partnering with mortgage provider SA Home Loans that will allow Capitec to almost triple home loans.
The bank’s credit impairment dropped 5% to R8.3 billion. The decline lifted its credit loss ratio to 7.5%, compared with 8.7% in the previous year.
Capitec was founded by Michiel le Roux in 1997, three years after Nelson Mandela led the African National Congress to victory in the nation’s first election at the end of apartheid. The lender was spun off from financial services company PSG Group in March 2001, and listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in February 2002.
Under Fourie’s leadership, the company transformed from a challenger bank serving about 5 million customers in 2014 to a financial services company with more than 24.1 million personal and business clients.
Capitec’s share price has climbed 1,552% since Fourie’s appointment, helping the company retain its mantle as South Africa’s best-performing stock, and outstripping the benchmark FTSE/JSE Africa All Share index, which climbed 89% in the same period.