FINANCIAL SERVICES
Financial sector transformation body will not back BEE targets for assets
CEO Leon Campher warns that prescribed assets will trigger flight of foreign investments of about R3-trillion
The governing body tasked with negotiating new empowerment targets for the financial services sector says it will not support any legislation prescribing that a bigger share of the country’s assets must be managed by black companies. "It’s not guaranteed that prescription will achieve anything. Under the apartheid government, prescribed assets messed up the market completely. It’s not the way to go if you want to stimulate economic growth," said Leon Campher, CEO of the Association for Savings and Investment SA (Asisa), one of the members of the Financial Sector Transformation Council (FSTC), previously the Financial Sector Charter Council. By legislating prescribed assets, the government can dictate where and how pension funds should invest. "SA is sitting with a huge trade account deficit. If we do something like prescribed assets, we will have flight of foreign investments of about R3-trillion. It’s not a solution," Campher said.
But he said Asisa members had resolved to gi...
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