Standard Bank, Africa’s biggest lender by assets, has increased its stake in Investec to almost 6%, a week after the Sim Tshabalala-led banking major upped its stake in Nedbank.
Investec on Wednesday said “Big Blue”, as the lender is referred to in high finance circles due to the size of its balance sheet, now owns 5.95% of Investec Ltd.
Nedbank, which is making a foray into the sought-after East African market via its R13.9bn purchase of Kenyan-based NCBA, last week said Standard Bank bought shares amounting to an exposure of 5.57%.
Standard Bank has a sizeable asset management business in the form of Stanlib, which has more than R550bn in assets under management. Stanlib was established in 2002 as a joint initiative between Liberty and Standard Bank, creating one of South Africa’s large-scale asset managers.
The moves by Standard Bank, which has assets of about R3.4-trillion, to increase its exposure to rival banks comes as South African lenders are expected to report an uptick in profitability.
Read: Big six maintain grip on South Africa’s banking assets
Ratings agency Moody’s this week said it expects a 5%-10% increase in bottom-line profit among the country’s lenders to translate into broadly stable profitability metrics, with an average return on assets of about 1.2%.
Moody’s said earnings will be supported by credit growth of 5%-7% and a drop in provisioning charges to about 0.8% of gross loans, mitigating a squeeze on net interest margins from declining interest rates.
“Banks will remain committed to cutting costs but also to ongoing digital transformation, including through investment in new technology and payment systems, AI and cybersecurity,” Moody’s said. “We expect the sector’s cost-to-income ratio to remain in the 55%-60% range.”
Overwhelming dominance
South Africa’s six biggest banks hold 93% of the industry’s assets and have maintained their overwhelming dominance despite a flurry of new entrants looking to prise away market share.
The most recent data from the South African Reserve Bank shows Standard Bank held 25% of the sector’s assets at the end of October 2025, followed by FirstRand with 22%, Absa at 20% and Nedbank at 16%.
Standard Bank became the third lender to breach the R500bn market valuation mark over the past month, joining FirstRand and Capitec in the elite club.
Standard’s market value has surged 42% over the past year and it had a market capitalisation of R508bn on Wednesday. FirstRand was worth R523bn and Capitec R510bn.
Absa is valued at R230bn, up 45% over the past six months. It is the sector’s best-performing stock since Kenny Fihla was appointed CEO.
Nedbank is valued at R128bn, while Investec’s South African business has a price tag of R38.7bn and its UK-listed business is worth R93bn.
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