Investment churn is one of the key short-term drivers of Purple Group’s earnings from EasyEquities, its low-cost, app-based share-trading and investing platform in which it owns 70% (Sanlam holds the remaining 30%).
That means investors actively trading shares, buying and selling in quick succession rather than accumulating over time. Churn tends to spike when markets move sharply, and in 2025 it did exactly that. The all share index fell about 12% in April before rebounding almost 30% from those lows, swings that translated directly into a surge in trading activity.
As CEO Charles Savage often notes, when markets fall, EasyEquities clients typically buy more — driving up volumes — and when markets rally sharply, it’s natural for many to bank gains on winners and rotate into new opportunities.
This is not to say EasyEquities’ strong performance was merely a windfall from market volatility. Growth across partner ecosystems such as Capitec and Discovery, together with rising product adoption and client engagement, showed a business benefiting from structural momentum, not just cyclical swings, as EasyEquities’ long-laid strategic foundations continued to compound at scale. In 2025, revenue rose more than 21%, profit before tax more than doubled, and the platform surpassed 1-million active clients for the first time.
As is often the case with Purple, the real debate may lie more in valuation than in management execution. Just as volatility can give earnings an extra cyclical boost, the share price has also experienced its own swings, falling to 53c last year after peaking at 328c in 2022. Today, the market is again looking ahead: Purple now trades on a trailing earnings multiple of more than 50, firmly in growth stock territory and well beyond most South African financial services peers. That isn’t completely unreasonable for a platform business with strong network effects, rising profitability and a long expansion runway, but it does heighten expectations. Unless Purple continues to produce strong growth and operating leverage, its lofty valuation could face a reckoning.
One of the more specific risks relates to offshore expansion, which remains a long-term opportunity but also a potential drag if timelines disappoint.
EasyEquities is preparing to launch in Kenya imminently, while its expansion into the Philippines has dragged on because it must first pass through a lengthy regulatory testing process. As Savage explains, the group intentionally targets markets that are not easy to enter, precisely because that is where global competitors such as Robinhood are least likely to make early inroads. But the downside is that difficult markets take time, sometimes years, and Savage is careful not to offer firm timelines for processes that sit outside his control. The upside is that any barriers EasyEquities faces on the way in will equally slow down potential rivals, meaning that if Purple succeeds in securing regulatory clearance and launching at scale, those same barriers will serve as a defensive moat rather than merely a delay.
The second major initiative is the introduction of financial advisers onto the platform, with the first phase scheduled for April
In South Africa, the picture is far more about opportunity than risk. Purple has already dismantled two long-standing myths: that South Africans are inherently poor savers, and that a mass retail investor base cannot be profitable. EasyEquities has shown that when ordinary people are given frictionless access, transparent pricing, intuitive interfaces and meaningful education they do save, they do invest, and they do stay engaged.
That ecosystem is now entering a phase where the flywheel becomes even more powerful. With EasyEquities’ cost base largely stabilised, about 70% of incremental revenue now flows directly to profit, creating an incentive to experiment boldly with new products and to double down on those that gain traction. One of the fastest early successes has been the EasyETFs range — active, rules-based ETFs that differ from unit trusts by trading in real time on the JSE, offering daily transparency and delivering active management at lower cost. Despite being only recently launched, the ETFs have scaled at a pace that confirms EasyEquities’ distribution advantage: when the platform adds something compelling, it reaches critical mass quickly because the community already exists and is primed to engage.
Over the next 12 months, two major initiatives are set to broaden that flywheel even further. The first is the launch of a South African stablecoin — essentially a rand-denominated, blockchain-based digital token designed to move faster and cheaper than traditional fiat transfers. As Savage notes, stablecoins offer real-time settlement, full on-chain auditability and ultra-low transaction friction.
While adoption in South Africa will likely be gradual rather than explosive, Purple believes the long-term trend is unambiguous: stablecoin rails will increasingly supplement legacy payment infrastructure. For EasyEquities, this opens up new ways to reward client behaviour, reduce friction across deposits and withdrawals, and eventually enable cross-platform interoperability with partners.
The second major initiative is the introduction of financial advisers onto the platform, with the first phase scheduled for April. This effectively pulls the advisory industry into the EasyEquities ecosystem. As Savage notes, the team has spent the past year building a system that allows advisers to onboard and manage the advised portion of their clients’ portfolios directly through EasyEquities. The aim is to give investors a single access point for both self-directed and adviser-supported investing, all underpinned by EasyEquities’ existing execution and custody infrastructure. For advisers, it unlocks digital distribution at scale; for EasyEquities, it opens a new advised-assets revenue stream and deepens platform stickiness by keeping wealth creation and wealth management under the same roof.
If management executes well, far from being tapped out, the South African market may still be in the early stages of what EasyEquities’ model can unlock. Just don’t expect the financial performance, or share price, to move in a straight line.
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