Standard Bank squares up to upstart lenders in SME battle
Africa’s biggest lender says it is guarding against new entrants emulating Capitec’s retail banking rise
Standard Bank CEO Sim Tshabalala says the bank will not allow upstart lenders to gain a foothold in the small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME) lending market as this will allow them to eventually “move up the value chain” much like Capitec has done in the retail banking segment.
Likening the rapid inroads being made into business banking by the likes of TymeBank and African Bank to the emergence of Capitec two decades ago, Tshabalala says incumbent banks will not make the same mistake twice. Capitec, which was only registered as a bank in 2001, has since racked up 18.1-million clients to emerge as SA’s biggest retail bank by customer numbers with a market value that threatens to surpass that of 160-year old Standard Bank...
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