{"id":805298,"date":"2025-01-10T07:04:10","date_gmt":"2025-01-10T05:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=805298"},"modified":"2025-01-10T07:04:10","modified_gmt":"2025-01-10T05:04:10","slug":"capitecs-billionaires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/banking\/805298\/capitecs-billionaires\/","title":{"rendered":"Capitec’s billionaires"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Capitec is one of South Africa\u2019s biggest success stories, and in the process, it has created some of the country\u2019s richest people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capitec has its origins in the PSG Group\u2019s microlending business. In 1997, PSG acquired SmartFin and FinAid, which had 68 microlending branches between them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PSG wanted to establish a dominant position in the fragmented microlending industry, which then comprised some 2,500 players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following management changes at PSG in 2000, the microlending business was spun out as a subsidiary of PSG\u2019s banking business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capitec Bank was established in March 2001 and from the outset it was headquartered in Stellenbosch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bank faced significant challenges in the early days, including strict regulations, big capital requirements, and the dominance of large retail banks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backing from PSG, which provided Capitec with a significant amount of equity capital, helped it to overcome these challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2003, the bank was unbundled out of PSG, leading to a wider shareholding structure for Capitec.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was initially focused on growing its microlending business and gained 27% of microloans handed out by banks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It started to focus on transaction banking services, and in 2003, Capitec launched its Global One savings account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It invested large amounts in technology and disrupted the local banking sector by offering longer banking hours and more accessible branches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The management team identified four values that would always remain priorities to this day: accessibility, simplicity, affordability, and personalised service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur focus has always been on our clients, and we wanted to make sure that people could access their banking when they needed to,\u201d Capitec CEO Gerrie Fourie said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It showed strong growth, and by 31 August 2005, it had 1,771 employees, of whom only 300 were back-office workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2008, Capitec entered the online space by introducing Internet banking to simplify banking for its 2 million clients. A year later, it launched cellphone banking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also rolled out new biometric scanners approved by the FBI in the USA. At the time, scanning only one fingerprint was the norm, but it scanned all 10 fingers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By 2011, it had 3.7 million clients and started opening branches on Sundays. Three years later, the Capitec banking app was launched.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The strong growth continued. It went from 55 branches and 25,000 clients after opening the business on 1 March 2001 to 840 branches and 15 million clients twenty years later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its latest financial results, Capitec revealed that it has grown its active client base to 23.2 million, with 12.4 million banking app clients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company is also entering business banking. In November 2019, it acquired Mercantile Bank and started offering services to South African businesses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capitec\u2019s success is seen in its share price growth. It was listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) on 18 February 2002.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since it was listed on the JSE, Capitec\u2019s share price has grown by 235,322%, making the bank one of the most successful shares on the exchange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This astonishing share price growth had created tremendous wealth for its founders and chief executives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although some of the founders, like Riaan Stassen, have sold a large part of their shareholding over the years, they still became ultra-rich.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is a look at a few of the key people at Capitec, with an estimate of their wealth through their shareholding in the business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It should be noted that this is not their net wealth. It is only the value of their Capitec shareholding. Their net wealth is higher than these figures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Michiel Le Roux \u2013 R41.3 billion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Michiel Le Roux founded Capitec Bank and served as the inaugural chief executive officer until 2004. He later served as chairman of the board between 2007 and 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He holds 13.2 million Capitec shares, representing 11.36 million of the company\u2019s total share capital, which is worth around R41.3 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Jannie Mouton \u2013 R18.5 billion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Jannie Mouton Familie Trust and its subsidiaries own 5.9 million Capitec shares, with equates to 5.1% of the company. It is worth R18.5 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mouton is the founder of PSG, the company behind Capitec. \u00a0PSG played a pivotal role in Capitec\u2019s success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Piet Mouton \u2013 R21.2 billion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Piet Mouton is the son of Jannie Mouton and the chief executive of PSG Group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mouton owns 6,752,536 Capitec shares, representing 5.82% of the company\u2019s share capital worth R21.16 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Gerrie Fourie \u2013 R3.2 billion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Capitec CEO Gerrie Fourie<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Gerrie Fourie is one of the company\u2019s founders and current chief executive, a position he has held since 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fourie owns 1,027,673 Capitec shares, representing 0.89% of the company\u2019s share capital worth R3.22 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Henk Lourens \u2013 R1.6 billion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Henk Lourens served as head of Capitec\u2019s acquisitions department when it was founded and then transitioned to operations manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He holds 495,158 Capitec shares, representing 0.43% of the company\u2019s share capital, worth R1.55 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Riaan Stassen \u2013 Unknown<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Riaan Stassen is one of the co-founders of Capitec Bank. He served as CEO until 2013 and was non-executive chairman from 2016 to 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stassen was a big Capitec shareholder. However, he sold shares over the years, and by 2017 only owned 1.2 million shares.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It can be assumed that Stassen is a billionaire based on his previous shareholding and the shares he sold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Capitec is one of South Africa\u2019s biggest success stories, and in the process, it has created some of the country\u2019s richest people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":805303,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[961],"tags":[1798,20195,4670,20140,21313],"class_list":["post-805298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-banking","tag-capitec","tag-gerrie-fourie","tag-jannie-mouton","tag-michiel-le-roux","tag-piet-mouton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=805298"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":805306,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805298\/revisions\/805306"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/805303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=805298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=805298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=805298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}