{"id":6341,"date":"2026-06-09T01:08:51","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T01:08:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/?p=6341"},"modified":"2026-06-09T01:08:51","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T01:08:51","slug":"banking-for-south-africas-mid-corporate-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/?p=6341","title":{"rendered":"Banking for South Africa\u2019s mid-corporate market"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/iframe.iono.fm\/e\/1683781?layout=modern\" width=\"100%\" height=\"170\" frameborder=\"0\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>You can also listen to this podcast on iono.fm here.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN:<\/strong> South Africa\u2019s mid-corporate market is the real driver of the economy. It\u2019s where jobs are created, and is the supply-chain engine for everything from mining to manufacturing.<\/p>\n<p>Banking in the mid-corporate segment requires a rather unique approach. It\u2019s more than financial metrics or transactions.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s about understanding the people behind businesses, developing trust, putting your faith in experienced management teams with conviction, and structuring funding around how businesses actually operate.<\/p>\n<p>Nedbank has made this a key focus of its business, and we\u2019re joined now by Basheer Kolia, executive for mid-corporate credit at Nedbank Commercial Banking, to explore this further.<\/p>\n<p>Hi Basheer, thanks very much for your time. Maybe let\u2019s start off and explain the mid-corporate market for people who don\u2019t know what it is and why it\u2019s so important to the economy.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>Hi, thanks for having me. Nedbank defines the mid-corporate market as businesses with a turnover greater than R750\u00a0million.<\/p>\n<p>We also look at mature businesses with strong balance sheets, and the majority of the time [those] with a closely held group of shareholdings \u2013 typically a family-owned business or a group of closely held shareholders, but privately held and unlisted.<\/p>\n<p>We also define it as companies that look to the private credit markets and to the commercial banks for funding, rather than looking to the larger debt capital markets.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN: <\/strong>All right. So these mid-sized companies obviously have need for credit at some point in their growth. Talk about that, and do you take a different approach at Nedbank when you\u2019re evaluating these companies and making credit decisions?<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>Yes, that touches on a key concept that Nedbank has launched into the market through its mid-corporate division.<\/p>\n<p>A key part of your relationship with businesses is a credit relationship in the mid-corporate space, because they are seeking facilities to support their growth.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>We take a different approach in the sense that we have a dedicated credit committee that looks after these businesses. We also have a dedicated credit <em>team<\/em> that looks after these businesses.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>So we go out to your business, we assess your business, meet the management team, kick the tyres and really understand your strategy.<\/p>\n<p>And we understand your vision for the business \u2013 so how did you get here and how are you going to take it to the next level in terms of your ambitions as an entrepreneur?<\/p>\n<p>We put that as a key fundamental building block behind your financials and behind how we assess your business.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN: <\/strong>Now talk about banking in the mid-corporate market, how it differs from traditional corporate banking, and Nedbank\u2019s approach, because you\u2019ve got a fairly unique approach to this particular market.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>Exactly. You have hit the nail on the head.<\/p>\n<p>We don\u2019t segment the mid-corporate business into an SME [small or medium-sized enterprise] or into a large corporate that would be banked in a corporate and investment bank.<\/p>\n<p>We understand the nuance in the segment and, as I mentioned, we understand the entrepreneur behind it.<\/p>\n<p>What we offer is a strong advisory component to our value proposition in the market. So your credit comes along with an advisory component.<\/p>\n<p>We have advisory specialists in the field of leverage finance, agricultural specialists, as well as trade-finance specialists.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>We bolt that on with our credit component and we look to give you a structured solution to your funding \u2013\u00a0so you\u2019re not boxed into a product that you as a business have to then use as the bank sees fit.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>We tailor the credit product to your business, into your cash flow. So we can actually look at your working capital cycle, we can look at your capex plans, we look at your acquisition ambitions and how you want to actually run and fund your business \u2013 and we tailor the need towards that.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s a key differentiator in the market from Nedbank.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN: <\/strong>Right. Now, there have been some fairly major disruptions to the mid-corporate market this year. If you look at the war in the Middle East, we\u2019ve had higher fuel prices, inflation is up, so are interest rates. So, how are the mid-corporates adapting to this?<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>That\u2019s a question we spend a lot of time unpacking, both as Nedbank and with our clients in the mid-corporate sector.<\/p>\n<p>We are seeing increasing macro shocks globally, as you\u2019ve mentioned, and those also are having increased shocks on South Africa. We are part of the global economy.<\/p>\n<p>So we are working quite closely with our clients and with businesses to ensure that they can withstand these shocks.<\/p>\n<p>Some of the tools that our clients have at their disposal are to look at how they can derisk from this in the sense of operational efficiencies, building in liquidity buffers, ensuring that they can actually negotiate better prices with their suppliers and customers and maintain margins.<\/p>\n<p>So there are a number of levers that South African businesses in the mid-corporate market can use. We as a bank support that, through ensuring that we provide facilities for short-term disruptions. We can provide headroom facilities. We can provide temporary facilities to allow you to trade through a period of disruption.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>That ensures that both the bank and the shareholders share in the risk of the business.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>We\u2019ve thought through this from end to end and \u2013 notwithstanding we\u2019ve had a number of disruptions, and our clients have traded through that \u2013 we\u2019re seeing a lot of businesses unlock cost efficiencies by bringing in new and more efficient machinery that actually allows them to withstand and trade at lower margins and still be profitable.<\/p>\n<p>So there are a number of levers, and we are working closely with our clients to make sure they\u2019re prepared and can unlock them at the right time.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN: <\/strong>Okay, a final question. Let\u2019s take a long-term view of the sector and what the mid-corporate banking market will look like in, let\u2019s say, five or 10 years.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>I think, through the cycle, banking is critical for the sector.<\/p>\n<p>You know that business is going to have a down year, and we don\u2019t penalise businesses for one year. We look through the cycle, we look at the history and the forecast.<\/p>\n<p>I think going beyond the financials and the numbers is critical. As I mentioned, having a great advisory component is key to this market.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>We are looking to establish a relationship, not a one-year or a one-period banking connection. We want a relationship that extends beyond the generations that actually will take the business into the future.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>A lot of the entrepreneurs in our segment are looking to grow this business, as they brought it to this point, to take it [forward] over the next 10, 20 and 50 years. And we want to work with these businesses over that period.<\/p>\n<p>So our plan in this segment is to be a long-term partner and actually grow this business from where it is to an inter-generational growth story, and that could even be a listed business on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange one day.<\/p>\n<p>So our role extends beyond funding and beyond advisory into really being a total partner to the client.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CIARAN RYAN: <\/strong>Okay. We\u2019re going to leave it there. That was Basheer Kolia, executive for mid-corporate credit at Nedbank Commercial Banking. Thank you very much for your time, Basheer.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BASHEER KOLIA: <\/strong>Thanks so much, Ciaran. I appreciate it.<\/p>\n<p><em>Brought to you by Nedbank Mid-corporate.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Moneyweb does not endorse any product or service being advertised in sponsored articles on our platform.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>#Banking #South #Africas #midcorporate #market<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You can also listen to this podcast on iono.fm here. CIARAN RYAN: South Africa\u2019s mid-corporate market is the real driver of the economy. It\u2019s where jobs are created, and is&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6342,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[410,954,33,3159,409],"class_list":["post-6341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-investing","tag-africas","tag-banking","tag-market","tag-midcorporate","tag-south"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6341\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fintechpulse8.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}