{"id":11171,"date":"2012-06-06T22:57:16","date_gmt":"2012-06-06T20:57:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/06\/update-2-s-africas-absa-buys-store-card-business-for-1-2-bln\/"},"modified":"2012-06-06T22:57:16","modified_gmt":"2012-06-06T20:57:16","slug":"update-2-s-africas-absa-buys-store-card-business-for-1-2-bln","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-2-s-africas-absa-buys-store-card-business-for-1-2-bln\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 2-S.Africa&#8217;s Absa buys store card business for $1.2 bln"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Deal boosts Absa market share in unsecured lending<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Absa to also extend credit to Edcon customers<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Tiisetso Motsoeneng and Agnieszka Flak<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>JOHANNESBURG, June 6 (Reuters) &#8211; South African bank Absa<br \/>\n will pay $1.2 billion for the store credit card<br \/>\nbusiness of unlisted domestic retailer Edcon, it said on<br \/>\nWednesday, bulking up its presence in the high-margin but<br \/>\nriskier unsecured lending market.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Under the deal, Absa, majority-owned by Britain&#8217;s Barclays<br \/>\nPlc, will also extend credit and sell other financial<br \/>\nproducts to the nearly 4 million customers of South Africa&#8217;s<br \/>\nbiggest clothing retailer.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Banks in Africa&#8217;s top economy have been pushing into the<br \/>\nlucrative unsecured loan market, which relies solely on the<br \/>\ncustomer&#8217;s promise to pay back debt, to offset weak corporate<br \/>\ndemand for credit.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>However, household debt stands at a dangerously high level<br \/>\nof 70 percent of disposable income, and the central bank fears<br \/>\nthat may get worse as banks expand into the sector.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Edcon&#8217;s store card business operates primarily in South<br \/>\nAfrica, with smaller operations in Botswana, Namibia, Lesotho<br \/>\nand Swaziland.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Absa, South Africa&#8217;s biggest retail bank, which competes<br \/>\nwith Standard Bank, Nedbank and FirstRand<br \/>\n, said it also planned to buy the business in<br \/>\nneighbouring countries. The deal should close in the second half<br \/>\nof the year.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Deal boosts Absa market share in unsecured lending * Absa to also extend credit to Edcon customers By Tiisetso Motsoeneng and Agnieszka Flak JOHANNESBURG, June 6 (Reuters) &#8211; South African bank Absa will pay $1.2 billion for the store credit card business of unlisted domestic retailer Edcon, it said on Wednesday, bulking up its [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-11171","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11171\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}