End of an era for Michael Jordaan-backed bank in South Africa
The Competition Commission has given Lesaka Technologies the green light to acquire Bank Zero, the digital bank co-founded by Michael Jordaan.
The commission recommended that the Competition Tribunal approve the proposed transaction whereby Lesaka would acquire Zero Research, without conditions.
Zero Research is the holding group that controls Bank Zero, a mutual bank incorporated in South Africa in terms of the Mutual Banks Act.
Bank Zero is an app-only digital bank which provides personal banking and business banking services, including transactional and cash investment accounts.
It was founded in 2018 by banking veterans Michael Jordaan and Yatin Narsai—who previously worked at FNB—and officially launched to the public in 2021.
Lesaka is wholly owned by Lesaka Technologies, a firm incorporated in the United States.
Lesaka provides financial technology products and services to underserved consumers and small businesses.
In South Africa, it also provides low-cost financial services to underserved and unbanked customers, including transactional accounts, insurance, micro-loans, transaction switching, and payment processing services.
The groups announced the terms of the proposed sale in July, whereby Lesaka would acquire Bank Zero in a deal worth R1.1 billion.
The main drive behind the deal was Lesaka looking to cross-sell banking services to its existing customer base in the country.
The transaction is structured to contain primarily a host of newly issued Lesaka shares and up to R91 million in cash.
Bank Zero’s shareholders will then own about 12% of Lesaka’s fully diluted shares.
As part of the deal, Jordaan will join the Lesaka board, while Narsai will join the executive leadership team. Their shareholding in Lesaka will be subject to lock-up agreements ranging from 18 to 36 months.
“The commission is of the view that the proposed transaction is unlikely to substantially lessen or prevent competition in any market,” the Competition Commission said.
“The proposed transaction does not raise significant public interest concerns.”
A new era for Bank Zero
While not being directly led by Michael Jordaan, Bank Zero owes a lot of its prominence and brand weight to the former FNB CEO’s involvement.
Jordaan built a name for himself in South Africa’s banking industry as the driver of innovation at FNB, being at the helm of the bank during its digital revolution.
Since leaving FNB and FirstRand, he has also built a reputation for investing in innovative and tech-driven start-ups through his investment firm, Montegray Capital.
According to Jordaan’s telling of the journey to launching Bank Zero, he had kept in contact with Yatin Narsai, the former head of IT and Retail banking at FNB, and they had a “meeting of minds”.
Jordaan said Yatin subsequently researched and found the Mutual Banking licence as a lower capital route, and assembled a team of mostly ex-FNB employees who had since resigned.
The bank was ultimately co-founded by Jordaan and Narsai, who served as chairman and CEO, respectively.
Despite launching during a difficult time for South Africa—with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, lockdowns and widespread financial hardship—the bank has, over the years, managed to carve out a small niche in the market.
According to the latest report by Lesaka, Bank Zero has over 40,000 funded accounts and more than R400 million in deposits.
However, outside of its established client base, the bank offers specialist technology, specifically its secure app-driven platform and low-cost, tech-enabled banking services.
Lesaka chair Ali Mazanderani said the transaction is a “transformative event” in the group’s journey, “embedding a trusted, well-engineered neobank capability into Lesaka’s fintech platform”.
With the Competition Commission approval and recommendation to the Competition Tribunal, the companies are now one step closer to securing a new future for the bank.
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