Capitec Bank revealed on Wednesday it has attracted more than 1.1 million new customers on its banking app.
According to the bank, its clients are able to stay safe and bank from home using its banking app, and benefit from lower transaction fees and zero data charges.
At the end of August 2020, Capitec said there were 4 million app users versus 2.9 million in the same period in 2019.
The banking group added that it recorded 5.2 million USSD users at the end of August 2020 compared to 4.7 million in 2019.
“Certain clients use both the app and the USSD channels. On average 7.3 million clients used either the app, USSD or both per month for the period March 2020 to August 2020,” the bank explained.
Capitec said that digital transactions increased by 52% for the 6 months ended in August 2020.
In March 2019, Capitec’s pricing strategy was to decrease the fees on debit orders and digital banking transactions to motivate clients to move from branch-based banking towards banking on their app or paying by card. Capitec also launched a new-design contactless-enabled card and new banking app with innovative transaction categorisation features in the second half of the year.
Capitec also informed investors that, despite the impact of COVID-19, the number of active retail banking clients grew by 6% to 14.6 million compared to 13.8 million at the end of February 2020.
“Client numbers grew by 2.0 million compared to August 2019. Banking clients’ income was negatively impacted by the lockdown and decreased by 25% in April 2020 compared to March 2020. By August income had returned to March 2020 levels,” it said.
As a result, Capitec said its headline earnings for the 6-month period ended August 2020 was R650 million, a decrease of 78% from R2.9 billion for the period ended August 2019. Retail banking generated headline earnings of R701 million and business banking a loss of R47 million. Impairment of intangible assets created on the acquisition of Mercantile Bank amounted to R4 million.
