Mary Vilakazi
Management
Everyone. Welcome to our results presentation for the year ended 30 June 2026. I will start our presentation with an overview of the macros informing our operating environment. The global policy and geopolitical economic environment remained uncertain and volatile over the year. In fact, as reflected by the Global Economic Policy Uncertainty Index, policy uncertainty is trending higher. For the group, we have had to navigate the tail end of the impacts of the Liberation Day tariff announcements and the impacts of the US-Iran war over the past financial year. The recent spikes in oil prices is not only increasing cost of living pressures but also raising government debt service costs. These fiscal pressures are adding to the uncertainty in the global policy environment. Given the importance of these debt markets to the global financial system and their implications for fiscal and monetary policy, the group continues to monitor these developments closely. Global economic uncertainty and financial markets volatility remained headwinds across most of the group's portfolio. However, several markets, including South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, and Zambia, benefited from ongoing structural reform implementation and positive terms of trade. In South Africa, whilst the US-Iran war contributed to the contraction in the final quarter of our year end, ongoing reform implementation supported stronger full year growth relative to the previous year and should support a recovery within the current financial year. Although the oil price shock interrupted the steady decline in South Africa's inflation and repo rate, the improved structural backdrop and commodity price tailwinds helped support the ZAR and contain the related inflation. This allowed the South African Reserve Bank to respond in a measured way to the breach of its inflation target. That said, the increase in inflation and the policy rate weighed on affordability towards the end of the year. The group expects one more rate increase over the next few months, but as the oil price impact fades over the next year, there should be room for renewed cuts. Our near-term strategies are anchored to this forecast macro outlook improvement. I will now move on to the group's results and unpack our performance. I want to begin by explaining how the group's performance tracked against the guidance we provided to the market when we published our June 2025 results. The earnings growth guidance provided was for earnings to grow mid-teens, and this was anchored to the operational performances we were expecting from our South Africa and broader Africa businesses. We were clear that the expected earnings growth did not factor in any additional U.K. motor provisions in FY 2026 following the Supreme Court's judgment. On this basis, earnings increased 16% at an ROE of 21.5%. It is worth noting that almost all the income statement line items we unpacked in our prospect statement have tracked in line with the guidance, demonstrating the strong top-line growth, improved profitability and returns from FNB and RMB in particular. It is also worth noting that the dividend we are paying is anchored to this level of earnings growth, up 16% thanks to the group's strong capital position. Two material events shaped current year earnings outcomes and, as a result, defined the group's ongoing earnings base going forward. Disappointingly, in the end, the group was required to raise a provision following the final publication of the FCA's redress scheme. This impact resulted in normalized earnings contracting 5%. Remarkably, despite the size of this provision, the group's ROE remained within its target range at 18.3%. Secondly, as we announced to shareholders in April, the group has taken a decision to exit the U.K. consumer finance businesses, given the regulatory regime and look-back risk. This means that in these results, Aldermore is now classified as a discontinued operation. The exit process has started. We expect nine binding offers to be submitted by the end of September, following which a due diligence process will start, and then final binding offers will be submitted by December. Continuing operations, namely our South African and broader African businesses, is considered the basis for earnings growth, return profile, and capital generation going forward. Markos will unpack in detail the bridges shown here. At a high level, this slide is a reconciliation of earnings and ROE, including and excluding the U.K. provisions. Importantly, on the far right is normalized earnings on a continuing basis. My presentation unpacks the group's performance on this basis. Before I move to continuing operations, I want to cover Aldermore's performance this year. Operationally, the business continued to see positive. There was strong balance sheet growth supported by an improved technology stack, enabling greater production, improving operational leverage, and implementation of capital optimization initiatives. Credit normalized over low base in the prior year, with additional Middle East related provisions raised offsetting the good credit experience throughout the year, supported by improved collections effort. Costs increased above plan as Aldermore also accelerated the program to offshore a number of roles and incurred additional costs in the process. Additional costs were also incurred by Aldermore relating to the group's decision to exit the market and prepare for a sales process. Other than that, I think cost control remains very good. What remains disappointing is the ongoing reduction in net interest margin. However, with a new owner with potentially a different funding base, this NIM position should, over time, stabilize and improve. This slide unpacks key highlights of the performance by the continuing operations. The call-out for me here is the growth in earnings of 13%, which is a direct result of the operational performances of the franchises excluding U.K. The ROE, which excluding the U.K., is now above our stated range. The cost to income ratio at 48% continues to reduce. We have many initiatives underway to further improve the group's operational leverage, and our ambition is that this ratio trends down to the mid-40s over the medium term. This is net asset value and NIAC or economic profits presented on a continuing basis for two of our important shareholder value metrics. Pleasingly, NAV increased by 9%. The 24% growth in economic profits to ZAR 20 billion is truly impressive. The group's focus has always been on capturing the highest share of economic profits in the markets we operate in. This outcome demonstrates that the growth strategies of our large franchises are still anchored to growing economic profits, resulting in a high-quality earnings and superior return profile. The group's superior ROE benefited from an ongoing improvement in return on assets, which increased another eight basis points in the period, and it is back at 2018 levels. This was again a result of the quality of our operational performance, particularly the growth in investment income, a strong recovery in trading income, and improved impairment. Gearing continued to decrease, meaning that the ROE uplift is not as a result of increased gearing. The structural composition of our ROE reflects the shape of our portfolio today, the strategies we are pursuing, and our FRM discipline. This is a snapshot of the operational performances delivered by our client-facing franchises. They have done very well this year, more than holding their own in a fiercely competitive operating environment. The main call-outs here is the earnings growth and improved ROE from FNB, the engine room of the group's earnings, which resulted from the size of the deposit franchise, which continues to grow off an ever higher base. The solid advances growth with stronger production volumes and improved credit performance. Cost management was commendable given the increased spend on FNB expanding its footprint and distribution, as well as coming up with new product solutions. RMB really had a standout year, particularly the improvement in ROE. The SA franchises performed well with PBT up 17% and the in-country CIB franchises in broader Africa having a very strong performance. WesBank's performance was characterized by new business production at historic high levels. Earnings were impacted by an increase in impairments as a result of front book strain given the high levels of origination over the past two years. Proactive provisioning was taken for the Middle East war and the structural adjustment to the vehicle prices market as a result of increased cheaper cars into the SA market. Outside of these highlighted provisions, the credit experience for WesBank was in line with our expectations and where we are in the cycle. I will now cover the performance across our standard themes. Let me start with the strength of our origination franchise. This slide unpacks the group's current origination posture. Let me start by saying that this has evolved as we become more constructive on the macros. We continue to focus on capturing an outsized share of high-quality credit, but at the same time, we are leaning in on certain growth themes. Vehicle asset finance is one of those themes, as we have seen an ongoing demand and structural growth opportunities in the market with new entrants from China. We continue to provide support to SMEs as the economic activity lifts across household and corporates. We believe this should benefit small and medium-sized businesses. Our corporate and commercial origination thesis continues to be anchored to targeted sectors, including those that are early beneficiaries of structural reforms. We continue to lean into sustainable finance as a theme. Capital optimization initiatives have created additional capacity to support lending into a wider cohort of existing customers, particularly in retail and business banking, where FNB is generally under-lent. The strategy to expand lending to a customer cohort previously underserved by us will be supported by the Optasia partnership as they bring different credit scoring capabilities and products that we can leverage into our existing customer base. Anchored to some of the themes I have just covered, we saw solid advances growth of 7% across the portfolio, and particularly in the second half of the year. WesBank delivered ongoing strong advances growth of 14%, supported by new business volumes in vehicle asset finance and 13% in asset-backed finance. Commercial advances growth, albeit softer this year, reflects the benefit of FNB's long-term strategy to focus on sectors exposed to structural reforms and cyclical growth trends. FNB continues to lean in to support SMEs and the community economy, where advances were up 25%. RMB's origination engine delivered a net new business production of 13% up. RMB continues to exceed the group's sustainable finance targets, with ZAR 283 billion having been facilitated since 2022. RMB continues to focus on capturing structuring and advisory fees through the origination franchise, and this has resulted in enhanced margins and ROE through the distribution activities. Distribution of assets came to ZAR 43 billion this year, impacting the advances growth for RMB, which is up 2%. Excluding RMB's distribution activities, group advances would have been up 10%, a pleasing outcome, and for me a testament to the growing set of opportunities that are available to the group's franchises for growth. This slide is a high-level snapshot of the group's improved credit performance. Markos will cover this in much more detail in his presentation. Favorable macro conditions provided support for most of the year. In the final quarter, some additional FLI provisions were raised due to the geopolitical uncertainty emanating from the Middle East conflict. It is pleasing that despite proactive additional provisioning of ZAR 1.1 billion, the credit performance still contributed positively to the group's operational performance. Impairments would have decreased by 6% instead of being 2% up on last year. Good to see the change in profile. The group benefited from the Treasury's active management of interest rate and ALM risks. Sorry, my slides are not cooperating. Lisa, go back. The group benefited from the group Treasury's ongoing active management of interest rate and ALM risks, ensuring the group earns appropriate value from interest rates, credit and liquidity premium. In the current year, continued disciplined execution of this strategy produced ZAR 3.3 billion of NII above the overnight policy rate. The ALM framework is set to produce resilient outcomes, taking into account various tested scenarios designed to protect and enhance the group's earnings with lower volatility. As a reminder to shareholders, the strategy has delivered ZAR 19.5 billion since inception in 2018. This graph demonstrates the strength of the group's deposit franchise with cumulative 10-year growth of 34% ahead of the aggregate money supply growth. This outcome reflects strong, diversified main bank relationships across various client segments, supported by very good product offering that enable our customers to access savings and liquidity easily throughout their life cycles. The group has deliberately focused on ensuring that savers are appropriately rewarded across the multiple savings and deposit offerings. The scale and quality of this franchise supports a superior risk-adjusted NII, which underpins the group's ROE. A key highlight for me is the group's margin that increased by 29 basis points, supported by disciplined FRM execution across the franchises, which balance growth with risk-adjusted returns and asset mix. Asset margins contributed 12 basis points, with improvements in deposit mix and funding costs adding a further 13 basis points. The group's ALM strategies fully protected the structural interest rate position against the 89 basis points reduction in policy rates, with capital endowment, including ALM, contributing four basis points. This was partly offset by lower returns on liquid assets in the group treasury, while broader Africa again contributed positively to group margin. I will now Okay. Thank you. I will now cover the contribution from the group's diversified and growing sources of NIR. Okay. The group continues to benefit from its long-term strategy to grow new sources of non-interest revenue. However, it is impressive to see that the fee and commission income line, despite a very high base and fierce competition pressures, it is still delivering solid growth. RMB's strategy to capture structuring and advisory fees as part of the origination strategy contributed strongly to NIR, and the global markets business recovery delivered excellent trading income. Once again, RMB's private equity businesses produce both healthy levels of dividends, ongoing earnings, and realizations. FNB's overall NIR continues to reflect its strategy to defend and grow its transactional franchise. The slide shows that the business continues to achieve steady growth across traditional sources of fees and is importantly scaling new sources of fees as some of these fees structurally reduce in the market. Digital wallets and PayShap are showing very strong growth, particularly following the decision to make PayShap its default real-time payment solution on the FNB app. The graph in the middle demonstrates ongoing strong traction in FNB's longstanding strategy to monetize its platform by providing numerous value-added services. FNB Connect is scaling strongly with over 3 million users transacting on its platform, in addition to having 1 million users on the MVNO license doing very well. Markos will unpack in more detail the insurance performance. Profit growth was dampened by ongoing investment in distribution and advisory capacity. Pleasingly, short-term insurance reached profitability this year, an important milestone for this business, and there is still plenty of runway in both retail and commercial customer bases. Good growth continues to be generated on the group's own licenses, as reflected in the new business APE numbers on the slide. The growth in the in-force APE for both life and short term demonstrates the quality of these books. FNB life business continues to be a key contributor to the group's NIR, having paid ZAR 9.5 billion in dividends since inception to the group. Our Invest strategy is also a key part of our net interest revenue diversification strategy and growing our client franchises. It deepens entrenchment, supports cross-sell, and generates capital-light income. Invest has not yet scaled as quickly as insurance. However, I believe we are finally seeing better traction, particularly since we took the decision to focus on servicing the needs of our own customer base. This has resulted in both inflows from Ashburton and FNB Wealth and Investments on the back of consistent investment performance and expanding distribution. Ashburton received close to 60% of its inflows from RMB's corporate client base, which has been as a result of a successful fixed income strategy. FNB Wealth and Investments is scaling its cross-sell to own customers, and penetration is still low, so there is still a lot of runway for growth for this business. I have already mentioned the positive contribution to NIR from the recovery in RMB's Global Markets business. As can be seen from this slide, the recovery was broad-based 2024 levels. Pleasingly, the performance came from increased client flows in line with strategy. There are strong signs that this performance is sustainable. The de-risking decisions we took last year have removed concentrations and freed up capacity to maximize opportunities as demonstrated by the T during this past year. The implementation of some technology platform refinements is providing the Global Markets business with increased capabilities that is scalable. The final point I'd like to make here is that RMB's recent operating model change to support a more client-centric strategy will also provide support to Global Markets. There is increased focus in RMB on cross-selling Global Markets products into the existing broader corporate client base, and the results are encouraging. Furthermore, the successful scaling of the corporate transactional banking will also provide further support to Global Markets growth. I will now spend some time adding a bit more color to the operational performances of the franchises that I've already called out before handing over to Markos. I've called out the excellent Oh, this clicker and me today are not doing well. Okay. I've already called out the excellent growth in PBT from FNB. If we drill down to some of the detail, we can see that this was driven by customer growth, high advances growth in both unsecured and residential mortgages, cross-sell, and ongoing deposit gathering. When considering the customer growth per segment, it's important to provide context to FNB's strategy to focus on providing customers with products and solutions appropriate to where the customers are in their life cycle. This means that close to 300,000 customers migrate annually from the personal segment to the private segment. Hence, we refer to pre-and post-migration. Despite fierce competition, the personal segment did well to grow customers. More impressively by this segment is the growth in deposits, up 16% before migration. The private segment grew their customer growth solid 8%, driven by new customer acquisitions and migrations. Private segment continues to focus on increasing specialist and advisory skills to unlock more specialist lending and broader lending into the client base, including a homecoming effort to ensure that all our private segment customers are well looked after by us and not our competitors. The results are evident in the record production and payouts across a number of asset classes. FNB is also benefiting from the partnership strategy, which we look to add capabilities, distribution, and footprint. Distribution has been enhanced through the Pick n Pay and Boxer partnerships. There are also some exciting product launches imminent, developed with Optasia, which will see FNB's strategy expanding its lending activities. I believe that the launch is imminent next week, Lytania. Another important growth strategy for FNB is the community economy. We have seen strong advances growth, but just as importantly, FNB continues to strengthen its position in community-based savings through its Stokvel value proposition. Impressively, deposits increased this year by 31% to ZAR 5.7 billion on the Stokvel platform, with active accounts growing 23%. FNB commercial customer growth continues to show good momentum, generating growth in transactional volumes and lending. The commercial deposit franchise remains by far the largest in South Africa. SME lending continues to be a focus area, which was a driver to the 25% increase in advances in the community economy. Merchant acquiring activities have started to improve since the launch of the refreshed product and device offering in March post the repricing of fees in an increasingly competitive space. Since the relaunch, we have given back in pricing benefits to existing merchants a total of ZAR 150 million. Pleasingly, sales volumes have lifted 36% since the relaunch in March, and momentum continues to be encouraging in ensuring that we maintain our market share in this space. I have already covered the strong origination in WesBank and the resultant new business strain. One of the additional call-outs I would like to make on this slide is that we saw very pleasing growth in the origination from the collaboration between WesBank and FNB's personal segment in particular. WesBank continues to grow strongly in other business activities as well that are not on balance sheet through the joint ventures and partnership arrangements with OEMs, diversifying its sources of revenue whilst enabling its partners to grow as well. Lastly, WesBank still continues to capture the majority of the economic profits in the sector in South Africa. RMB delivered a very strong operational performance across its client-facing businesses. The investment banking division continued to deliver strong results across a wide range of lending and advisory activities, with an increasing focus on capital light activities. The South African franchise performed very well with PBT up 17%, and broader Africa contributed PBT up of 11%, which included the stellar in-country CIB growth of 53%. RMB's ROE improvements to 23% has been particularly pleasing to see, a level last reached in 2018. The HSBC transaction has successfully completed introducing over 400 entities into the group with a large multinational corporate base. The quality of the HSBC deposit book was also accretive to RMB's margin. Lastly, the client-centric operating model change in RMB, while still in an early phase, is showing very good traction with early runs on the scoreboard, increasing our confidence in the continued growth of the RMB franchise. The performance from the broader Africa portfolio is also pleasing. Despite the macro pressures in Botswana, one of our larger jurisdictions, the overall profitability held up well, supported by good performances from Namibia, Zambia, and Nigeria. The in-country CIB franchises across the portfolio saw a very strong performance, supported by the structural reform momentum in these markets. A special call-out to Zambia this year for delivery of excellent growth across a number of metrics, including paying a maiden dividend. Thank you. Presented on this slide is a walkthrough of the group's CET1 position that has maintained at elevated levels. The group accreted capital of 79 basis points with the incremental motor commission provision consuming 75 basis points. A CET1 ratio of 13.9% at the end of the reporting period is well ahead of the upper range of the internal target range of 12.5%, which translates into excess capital of ZAR 10 billion after payment of the final dividend. The strong capital position supports a dividend cover of 1.6 times at the bottom end of the board's target range. This cover translates into growth in full-year dividends per share anchored to earnings growth, excluding the current year motor provision, resulting in dividends being up 16%. Okay, I will now hand over to Markos. Markos.