For JSE-listed Purple Group, whose various digital businesses were always designed to be forward-looking, the future has arrived a lot sooner than expected - thanks to the pandemic.
And with this has come a massive boost to the bottom line, with the company, which owns 70% of online share-buying platform EasyEquities, delivering its strongest set of annual results in eight years.
"It's funny how unexpected events are always in the storyline of disruptive businesses. There is always something that no-one planned for or expected that was the tipping point for that business," said CEO Charles Savage in an interview on Friday after the release of the company's results for the year ended August 31.
"For us that tipping point was Covid. The key is the future of business. Commerce and finance has always been, for us, a digital opportunity.
"It's just that the future arrived faster because of Covid, which was an unexpected event that accelerated our business."
Purple reported that group revenue increased by 65% to R163m, while profit attributable to shareholders came in at R14.4m, compared to a loss of R9.5m the previous year.
250,000+
The number of active customers EasyEquities has
He said all the group's underlying businesses recorded growth, but "certainly the big growth story within the group has to be EasyEquities, and that comes through on every one of the metrics we report".
Revenue at EasyEquities, which has more than 250,000 active customers, increased by 136% to R96m, with Savage attributing the growth to "people having more time and less to do with their time" due to the lockdown, which encouraged online share trading.
"The lockdown provided the opportunity for people to take up digital services at a rate that no-one's ever seen before, and that was really good for us," he said.
The company said in its results statement that EasyEquities was "built with the deep desire and purpose to democratise all things investing".
It added: "Previously, investing was seen as an elite activity and was, to a great extent, an intimidating and even unaffordable option for the average Joe."
But with the internet becoming more affordable and accessible, EasyEquities identified the need to make trading easier for investors, it said.
Savage said the full-year results were the best the group had delivered in the eight years he has been CEO.
"We've been making promises about the growth of EasyEquities and for the most part we have delivered ahead of expectations. It's a very nice South African growth story at a time when there are not a lot of good stories going around."
Looking ahead, he said the group had also "put down some partnership rails" that should secure Purple Group growth in the years ahead.
One of these is SatrixNow, EasyEquities' partnership with Satrix, which is a platform to invest in Satrix exchange traded funds.
Purple Group said SatrixNow took on more than 50,000 new clients in the year ended August 31, which is the fifth year of the partnership.
He said one particularly strong growth area will be EasyEquities' partnership with Capitec Bank, which was officially launched after the year end.
In terms of the partnership, the bank's new app gives its clients access to the EasyEquities investment platform.
In the six weeks since the new banking app went live, some 50,000 users linked their Capitec banking app with the EasyEquities widget.
"That Capitec rail that we put down is going to provide lots and lots of growth in the years ahead."
Savage said the group also had some "other aces in the deck", adding that EasyEquities Properties, a fractional residential property investment platform launched three months ago, had more than 10,000 customers.
It also officially launched the EasyEquities Australia platform six weeks ago as "we want to grow the group in that region".
"We also have lots of other plans and initiatives that are too soon to speak about that we are confident are going to secure us growth in the year ahead," Savage said.
