Say hello to Capitec, just named the best bank in the world.

That’s according to the Lafferty Group’s 2017 Global Bank Quality Benchmarking study, which “ranks 100 major quoted banks across 32 countries for their longer-term sustainability and gives its highest ratings to banks that focus on serving their clients’ needs in retail and corporate banking”.

Rather amusingly, SA’s banks achieved the highest rankings out of the 32 for the second year in a row, but Capitec’s rating still manages to put our other banks to shame.

This via Fin24:

Capitec was awarded Lafferty Group’s highest 5-star rating, Absa achieved four stars, and FirstRand, Standard and Nedbank were given three stars.

“Capitec is a remarkable bank in that it is the only bank anywhere in the world among those we have rated that qualifies for a 5-star rating,” Lafferty group CEO Michael Lafferty told Fin24.

“It has very high financial ratios and also scores very highly in qualitative criteria like strategy, culture, customer satisfaction, management experience and living the brand. Most of all it is a highly focused bank.”

The only five-star rating in the entire world, and the likes of FNB and Standard Bank getting three – ouch.

As you can imagine Capitec Bank CEO Gerrie Fourie was pretty stoked:

“We value this recognition because it’s based on information available in the public domain and represents an objective view of our company, while validating the trust that our clients put in the Capitec brand.”

Capitec’s management team thanked its employees for their diligent pursuit to offer clients simple, affordable and transparent banking that helps them manage their money better.

“For us, this is just the start of the journey,” said Fourie.

Following the announcement, Capitec’s share price was up 0.33% at R796.

I really don’t care who you bank with, but for those of us who don’t bank with Capitec let’s just hope that five-star rating makes the other banks raise their game.

[source:fin24]