April 1, 2016

Solid half-year results for Purple Group

Purple Group published its unaudited half-year results today for the period ending 29 February 2016.

Purple Group is a retail-focused fintech company that was named SA’s number one stockbroker in 2015 by Financial Mail Investor’s Monthly and Intellidex. It’s a company we’re incredibly proud to work with both at group level and through its brands EasyEquities, Emperor Asset Management, GT247.com and GT Private Broking.

Also, thanks to the EasyEquities investment platform, we’re all proud shareholders in the group, which is listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. (You, too, can buy Purple Group shares! It’s really easy and it’s really cheap.)

Here are some of the top-line results:

  • Revenue of R65.5 million was up 4.6% compared to the same period in 2015 (R62.2m) – a solid result in a volatile market
  • Client funds are up 46.3%, currently sitting at R1.158-billion – the first time this figure has breached the billion-rand mark
  • The number of active clients in the group went up by 101.6%!
  • Capital distribution to shareholders was 0.65 cents compared to a dividend of 1 cent paid out over the entire 2015 financial year
  • Earnings and headline earnings per share were down 35.5% on FY 2015 for a number of reasons, including difficult trading conditions, a reduction in performance fees and investment in future growth. On the positive side, EasyEquities posted its first half-year of positive contribution to net revenue

Purple Group CEO Charles Savage says the results were solid considering the tough market conditions and the group’s investment in future growth initiatives.

“I don’t believe that there is a simple cookbook for success – ours or anyone else’s,” he says. “But, at the heart of everything we do lies the simple philosophy that, if you empower people, they will deliver extraordinary things. Empowerment doesn’t come from telling people what to do. Nor does it come from giving them rights or titles. Instead, empowerment comes from showing people what’s possible, daring them to dream, tooling them for their endeavours and, importantly, creating a fun, friendly, engaging, educational space for them to play, with safety nets for when they fall.

“This is the philosophy and culture of our workplace, it is the ethos of our board and it is an integral part of everything we do.”

“We’ve seen first hand the amount of work it takes to achieve good results in a turbulent market,” says CN&CO’s Carel Nolte, who is also part of the Purple Exco team. “Everyone at Purple is a team player, committed to their clients and committed to the company. Each and every Purplista is also a shareholder in the business, which makes a huge difference when it comes to thinking and decision-making. It’s their money they’re working with, which puts a whole different slant on things. The results speak for themselves.”

Big congratulations to everyone at Purple Group!

Purple Group unaudited summary consolidated results for the six months ended 29 February 2016

Listen to Charles discussing the results with Alec Hogg on BizNews.com:

https://soundcloud.com/biznews-com/sas-disruptive-share-market-fintech-play-purple-capital-hitting-its-straps