NATIONAL CREDIT ACT
Warning about pawn-while-you-drive transactions
The National Credit Regulator (NCR) says pawn-while-you-drive transactions are credit agreements, not pawn transactions, and are subject to the National Credit Act (NCA), Daily Maverick reports.
Entities that extend credit to consumers without registering as credit providers are in contravention of the NCA. Agreements lacking affordability assessments are unlawful and void. The agreements also breach various sections of the NCA because of unlawful interest, charges and fees.
Such pawn “arrangements” are simulated credit agreements and are concluded to bypass the NCA’s provisions, according to a spokesperson for the NCR.
SHARES
Investec outperforms its peers and the Alsi ‘by big margins’
Investec’s share price growth has not only overtaken its peers in the banking sector but also the benchmark FTSE/JSE All Share Index (Alsi), Moneyweb reports. Over the past three years, Investec’s share price has skyrocketed more than 95%, leading the gains in the banking sector by far and surpassing the Alsi, which rose nearly 38% over the same period.
Behind Investec is Absa (32.54%), Capitec (26.06%) and Nedbank (14%), with Standard Bank and FirstRand lagging, with growth of 6.97% and 5.73% respectively.
ESTATE PLANNING
Old Mutual buys digital wills start-up
Old Mutual’s strategic investment and venture-building business, NEXT176, has completed the outright acquisition of tech start-up Online Wills (Pty) Ltd, trading as QuickWill.
Old Mutual said the acquisition will enable it to offer a more comprehensive digital wills solution to financial advisers and business partners as an extension of the service already offered free of charge to the public. QuickWill has more than 50 000 registered users and 10 000 finalised wills in its banks in only a few months of operation, it said.
GENERAL
Discovery forecasts higher interim profit
Discovery expects normalised profit from operations to rise at least one-fifth when it releases its half-year results this week, the company said in a voluntary trading statement on Friday. It said normalised profit from operations will rise by between 20% and 25%, while normalised headline earnings per share will jump by between 27% and 32% to 555.9c to 577.8c.
The reporting period was affected by macro-economic volatility and central banks hiking interest rates in the markets in which Discovery operates. “These movements create volatility in Discovery’s headline earnings, but have little impact on the group’s solvency, liquidity and cash flows and have no impact on the operations of the group,” it said.
INSURANCE
Guardrisk launches platform for insurtech entrepreneurs
Cell captive insurance provider Guardrisk has started an incubation platform to lure insurtech entrepreneurs, a move it hopes will drive innovation in the risk and underwriting sector, Business Day reports.
The platform, called Launchpad, seeks to partner with venture capital investors to co-invest in and support entrepreneurs in insurtech, particularly those that have the potential to be scaled up. The platform will also work with insurtech start-ups, provided their solution is sufficiently innovative to make for a tangible business proposition.
Entrepreneurs should be able to show that there is a real need for their product or service, with solutions relating to customer engagement, product development and innovative technology-based business models.
