Capitec hit by sanctions and a R28 million fine

The Prudential Authority has imposed administrative sanctions and a R28 million fine on Capitec Bank for non-compliance with the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) Act.

This follows an inspection conducted in 2023, which found that Capitec had failed to comply with several parts of the Act.

Capitec was not the only institution to be hit with sanctions and a fine for non-compliance, as Ninety One Assurance also found itself in the hot seat.

On Friday, 11 September, the Reserve Bank’s Prudential Authority announced the decision to impose administrative sanctions on Capitec Bank and Ninety One Assurance.

The regulator said both actions followed an inspection conducted in 2023 under section 45B of the FIC Act.

This section empowers the Prudential Authority (PA) and similar bodies to conduct inspections into potential breaches of the legislation.

The 2023 inspections found several instances of non-compliance at Capitec Bank and Ninety One Assurance.

For Capitec, the Prudential Authority found that the bank had failed to:

• Conduct adequate customer due diligence on the sampled client files
• Conduct adequate enhanced due diligence on the sampled client files
• Conduct adequate ongoing due diligence on the sampled client files
• Provide ongoing training to the sampled employees
• Obtain management approval for its business bank’s anti-money laundering name screening and payment screening investigation manuals before implementation thereof
• Provide evidence that it had documented and approved end-to-end processes pertaining to terrorist property reporting (TPR) prior to receiving an inspection notification letter from the PA
• Adequately develop, document and/or provide for policies, procedures, standards and controls in its Risk Management and Compliance Programme relating to TPR and financial sanctions.

For all of these breaches combined, Capitec’s administrative sanctions consist of five cautions not to repeat the conduct that led to the non-compliance.

It also received a financial penalty totalling R28 million, R5.5 million of which is conditionally suspended for 36 months as from 13 October 2025.

The PA noted that Capitec has cooperated to remediate the identified compliance deficiencies and control weaknesses.

In Ninety One Assurance’s case, the PA found that the company had failed to:

• Adequately conduct enhanced due diligence on some of the sampled client files
• Adequately develop, document, maintain and/or implement a Risk Management and Compliance Programme (RMCP) that would enable it to effectively identify, assess, monitor, mitigate and/or manage its risk associated with sanction screening, prominent influential person screening, its business and its clients
• Provide evidence of adequately documented and implemented policies, procedures, and controls to provide for the manner in which and the processes by which, where applicable, it will comply with such obligations

For these breaches, Ninety One Assurance’s administrative sanctions include two cautions, two reprimands and a financial penalty totalling R6 million. 

R2.5 million of this penalty is conditionally suspended for 36 months as from 19 June 2025.

The PA also noted that Ninety One has cooperated and indicated that it has undertaken the remedial action required to address the identified compliance deficiencies and control weaknesses.