Capital Appreciation’s interim after-tax profit up 124%

JSE-LISTED Capital Appreciation produced a good set of maiden results for the six months to the end of September, with profit after tax jumping 124%, boosted by three acquisitions in May.

The investment holding company, which focuses on investing in and developing financial technology (fintech) enterprises, reported a profit of R60.1 million during the period, up from R26.9m compared with last year.

The group’s chairperson is Michael “Motty” Sacks and the joint chief executives are Michael Pimstein and Bradley Sacks.

The group declared a maiden dividend of 2 cents a share.

In October 2015, Capital Appreciation became the first special-purpose acquisition company to list on the main board of the JSE and raised R1 billion through a private placement of shares.

In May this year, the group completed the acquisition of 100% of three companies: African Resonance, Dashpay and Synthesis Software Technologies. It also announced its intention to invest in Resonance Australia and acquired a 17.45% interest in the Australian company.

Capital Appreciation has two divisions: Payments and Payment Infrastructure, and Software and Solutions. In the results, the group reported gross revenue of R223.4m, up 462.72% compared with R39.7m last year.

Earnings per share (Eps) and headline earnings per share (Heps) came in at 4.02c a share, reflecting an increase of 87% compared with last year’s Eps and Heps of 2.15c.

The group had a market capitalisation of about R1.2bn yesterday.