Business

South African companies targeting Asian country with over 115 million people

Luke Fraser

 ·8 Apr 2026

The Purple Group is expanding Easy Equities into the Philippines, aiming to capitalise on the massive population in the East Asian nation.

In its latest interim results for the six months ended 28 February 2026, the group said that EasyEquities Philippines is now live in a regulated sandbox with early users transacting in production.

The country has over 115 million people, and the group’s partner, GCash, has over 97 million registered users, of whom 80 million are active.

The group sees the path to scale as 1,000 users in April, 10,000 in May, and approximately 10,000 incremental users per month thereafter.

The group’s working assumption is 500,000 active users in the Philippines by the end of 2027, with incremental growth thereafter.

Notably, Easy Equities will not be the first relatively young South African financial company to head to the Asian nation, with the Tyme Group also heading there.

GoTyme Bank launched in the Philippines in October 2022 as a joint venture between the Gokongwei Group and Tyme.

By the end of 2025, GoTyme hit 8 million customers in the Philippines. Such is the success of the Filipino operations that the Tyme Group’s South African operations were rebranded to GoTyme.

Cheslyn Jacobs, the CEO of GoTyme Bank in South Africa, said the brand will now always launch as GoTyme when it launches in new markets.

Upside for the Purple Group

The Purple Group said that the opportunity in the Philippines is not reflected in its interim earnings, making it a powerful source of future growth on its already strong financial results.

In the group’s latest interim results, its revenue climbed by 8.8% to R258.5 million, but its operating expenses were tightly controlled, rising by just 0.5% to R161 million.

The centre of the group’s results was the Easy Group, where growth is accelerating. The Easy Group’s revenue increased by 18.5%, while costs edged up only 1.6%.

Active clients grew to 1.24 million, while total client assets surged to R94.9 billion, up 41.2% year on year.

“The numbers are doing the talking. The question coming into the year was simple: could we compound on a record FY2025? The answer is now clear,” said Purple Group CEO Charles Savage.

A key theme in the results was the emergence of operating leverage as a driver of performance, with revenue growing 11 times faster than costs.

The group also noted that EasyRetire Retail is a standout performer, with EasyRetire Retail Client Assets up from R0.7 billion three years ago to R2.1 billion today.

The group said its 1% transfer campaign, which offered 1% cash back for moving retirement funds, gave clients a direct financial incentive to bring their retirement assets home to EasyEquities.

Transfer clients have now been arriving with seven times the assets of the average EasyEquities retail client.

“South Africa has an enormous pool of retirement assets sitting in incumbent funds. We are early in a very large opportunity,” the group said.

Overall, the Purple Group reported profit attributable to ordinary shareholders of R40.6 million in the current period. Its basic and headline earnings per share increased by 21% to 2.86 cents per share.