Justin Lin’s&nbsp;F9&nbsp;finally opened in North America this weekend with a $70 million debut. Yes, that’s lower than the $71 million launch of&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious&nbsp;and every&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious&nbsp;movie since then, including&nbsp;Fast Five&nbsp;($86 million in 2011),&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious 6&nbsp;(a $117 million Fri-Mon launch in 2013),&nbsp;Furious 7&nbsp;($147 million in 2015) and&nbsp;Fate of the Furious&nbsp;($99 million in 2017). Considering that&nbsp;Fate of the Furious&nbsp;took an understandable drop from&nbsp;Furious 7&nbsp;(no nationwide mourning for Paul Walker, no generational coronation for the franchise, no super-cool notion of Jason Statham as the prime baddie, etc.), it would also make sense that&nbsp;F9&nbsp;would open below&nbsp;F8.



There were no real added value elements this time out, all due respect to John Cena’s decency and charisma and the #justice4Han folks. News that there would be 11&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious&nbsp;movies instead of ten made this Vin Diesel vs. John Cena flick less anticipated. The reviews were mixed-positive as was (comparatively speaking) audience buzz. It earned a B+ from Cinemascore, compared to a B+ for&nbsp;The Fast and the Furious&nbsp;back in 2001 (when it was an unknown quantity) and A or A- grades for every sequel since.&nbsp;F9&nbsp;likely wasn’t looking at another $97 million Fri-Sun/$117 million Fri-Mon debut weekend had it opened in a non-Covid world in Memorial Day weekend 2020.



That’s not to say that&nbsp;F9&nbsp;would have opened below $70 million in normal times, although&nbsp;Spectre&nbsp;opened with $70 million in 2015 and legged out to $200 million domestic/$881 million worldwide. In conventional circumstances,&nbsp;F9&nbsp;might have nabbed a $80 million Fri-Sun/$92 million Fri-Mon Memorial Day weekend debut. Considering the Covid curve, strong legs for&nbsp;A Quiet Place part II&nbsp;and the new normal of nine big-deal streaming platforms (Peacock, HBO Max, Paramount+ and Disney+ all didn’t exist two years ago) all offering your favorite movies for the monthly price of a single movie ticket, I’d argue that a $70 million Fri-Sun domestic launch for&nbsp;F9&nbsp;is close to “business as usual.”



It’s the biggest Fri-Sun debut weekend since&nbsp;Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker&nbsp;($179 million) in December of 2019.&nbsp;F9’s&nbsp;$30 million opening day was the biggest single-day gross since the first week of&nbsp;Episode IX’s domestic run.&nbsp;F9&nbsp;had a 2.3x weekend multiplier earned 10.2% of its opening via Thursday previews.&nbsp;Furious 9&nbsp;($147 million from a $67.4 million Friday and $15.6 million in Thursday previews) had a 2.18x weekend multiplier and earned 10.6% of its weekend via previews.&nbsp;Fate of the Furious&nbsp;($98.8 million/$46.5 million/$10.4 million) had a 2.12x multiplier and 10.5% via previews. It’s, by default, the leggiest Fri-Sun&nbsp;Fast&nbsp;sequel opener since&nbsp;Fast Five&nbsp;($86.2 million/$34.4 million/$3.8 million) in 2011.



The Fast Saga&nbsp;sequels have been pretty consistent.&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious&nbsp;($155 million from a $71 million debut),&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious 6&nbsp;($238 million from a $117 million Fri-Mon debut) and&nbsp;Fate of the Furious&nbsp;($226 million/$99 million) were arguably frontloaded.&nbsp;2 Fast 2 Furious&nbsp;($127 million/$50 million),&nbsp;Fast Five&nbsp;($210 million/$86 million) and&nbsp;Furious 7&nbsp;($353 million/$147 million) had over/under 2.5x multipliers.&nbsp;Hobbs &amp; Shaw&nbsp;($175 million/$60 million) benefited from being the last biggie of summer 2019 and legged out to 2.91x, while the glorified spin-off&nbsp;Tokyo Drift&nbsp;($62.5 million/$24 million) had a 2.6x multiplier. Presume a final domestic gross between $152 million and $170 million, with a possible upswing to $175-$180 million.



F9&nbsp;is not among the best-loved sequels but may have a pretty open field.&nbsp;Black Widow&nbsp;opens in two weeks, but after that it’s a question of whether&nbsp;Space Jam: A New Legacy&nbsp;(July 16) and&nbsp;Snake Eyes&nbsp;(July 23) break out. If not,&nbsp;F9’s got a month before&nbsp;Jungle Cruise&nbsp;(July 30) and&nbsp;The Suicide Squad&nbsp;(August 6). Since it opened above $50 million, it gets a 31-day window. That&nbsp;A Quiet Place part II&nbsp;is legging out like a champ despite a 45-day window, and that&nbsp;The Croods: A New Age&nbsp;earned $33 million of its $58 million cume after PVOD availability (on day 21), means it may not be a huge factor.



So, yes, at a glance, Universal’s choice to move&nbsp;F9&nbsp;to late June essentially worked in terms of kicking off what counts as the tentpole-centric portion of summer 2021. It was trying to do this summer what&nbsp;Tenet&nbsp;couldn’t do last summer, with the important caveat being that North American theaters were actually doing their part this time. Theaters nationwide (including New York and California this time) are open and the next wave of biggies (Black Widow, Space Jam 2, Jungle Cruise, Suicide Squad, Free Guy, etc.) are still on tap for cinemas alongside the various horror movies (The Forever Purge, Escape Room: Tournament of Champions, Old, Don’t Breathe 2&nbsp;and&nbsp;Candyman) already doing their part.



F9 had already earned $216 million in China (on par with Hobbs &amp; Shaw’s $201 million cume but down from Fate of the Furious’ $393 million cume) and $297 million heading into the weekend. Thanks to the North American debut and a combined $38 million “overseas debut” in Mexico, Brazil and the U.K., its new global cume is $405 million worldwide, becoming just the third Hollywood release to pass that milestone (after Bad Boys For Life in January 2020and Godzilla Vs. Kong this past March) in 2020 and 2021. It should swiftly zoom past Japan’s Demon Slayer: The Movie ($500 million) as both this year and last year’s biggest-grossing movie. Your move, Black Widow…



By Scott Mendelson, Forbes Staff

May Day Holiday Movies

Box Office: ‘F9’ Tops $400M Global With $70M US Debut

TOPLINE Amazon is preparing to make a $9 billion investment in the company’s film and television offerings by purchasing vaunted Hollywood studio&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2021/05/24/amazon-reportedly-close-to-buying-mgm-for-nearly-9-billion/?sh=74c23a063d4c">MGM</a>, the&nbsp;Wall Street Journal&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-nears-deal-to-buy-hollywood-studio-mgm-11621880759?mod=hp_lead_pos1" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>&nbsp;Monday, the latest in a string of major acquisitions the company has made to boost its standing in even more areas of people’s lives—here are the most notable:



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h3>



Amazon’s largest acquisition to date was when it&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-40306099" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">purchased</a>&nbsp;Whole Foods in 2017 for $13.7 billion.



The company has also spent more than a billion dollars on shoe ecommerce giant&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2009/11/02/amazon-closes-zappos-deal-ends-up-paying-1-2-billion/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Zappos</a>&nbsp;($1.2 billion in 2009) and autonomous vehicle company&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomtaulli/2020/06/27/amazon-buys-zoox-why-self-driving-technology-is-existential/?sh=7714dde17c0f">Zoox</a>, which is&nbsp;<a href="https://zoox.com/about/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">developing</a>&nbsp;a self-driving rideshare service ($1.2 billion in 2020).



Other pricey acquisitions include smart doorbell maker&nbsp;<a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2019/new-filing-amazon-spent-1-65b-acquisitions-2018-headlined-ring-pillpack-deals/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Ring</a>&nbsp;($839 million in 2018), online pharmacist PillPack ($753 million in 2018), video game streaming platform&nbsp;<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-buys-twitch-2014-8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Twitch</a>&nbsp;($970 million in 2014), robotics company&nbsp;<a href="https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/03/19/amazon-com-buys-kiva-systems-for-775-million/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Kiva Systems</a>&nbsp;($775 million in 2012) and&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2010/11/08/confirmed-amazon-spends-545-million-on-diapers-com-parent-quidsi/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Quidsi</a>, the parent company of Diapers.com and other ecommerce sites ($545 million in 2010).



Amazon has invested in its cloud computing arm Amazon Web Services—which now makes up the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2021/amazon-apple-facebook-google-acquisitions/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">majority</a>&nbsp;of the company’s operating income—by purchasing more than a dozen companies in that sector, including $500 million for mobile video service&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2015/09/03/amazon-acquires-elemental-technologies-for-a-reported-500-million-in-cash/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Elemental Technologies</a>&nbsp;in 2018 and $20 million for cyber security startup&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/09/amazon-aws-harvest-ai/?ncid=rss&amp;utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29&amp;sr_share=twitter" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">harvest.ai</a>&nbsp;in 2017.



In addition to its expected MGM purchase, Amazon has also invested in the film industry by acquiring&nbsp;<a href="https://venturebeat.com/2015/10/30/25-years-of-imdb-the-worlds-biggest-online-movie-database/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">IMDB</a>&nbsp;(purchased in 1998 as part of a $55 million acquisition with two other companies), DVD rental service&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/9aa7315e-2482-11e0-8c0e-00144feab49a" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Lovefilm</a>&nbsp;(for £200 million or approximately $317 million in 2011) and film grosses website&nbsp;<a href="https://variety.com/2008/digital/news/imdb-links-up-with-box-office-mojo-1117997423/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Box Office Mojo</a>&nbsp;(in 2008 for an undisclosed amount).



Amazon has strengthened its foothold in the book industry where it got its start by acquiring companies like audiobook seller&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/amazon-acquires-audible-for-300-million/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Audible</a>&nbsp;($300 million in 2008), social network&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2013/03/28/amazon-acquires-social-reading-site-goodreads/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Goodreads</a>&nbsp;(in 2013 for an undisclosed amount), book publisher&nbsp;<a href="https://money.cnn.com/2012/06/04/technology/amazon-avalon-books/index.htm" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Avalon Books</a>&nbsp;(in 2012 for an undisclosed amount) and used bookseller&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2008/08/01/amazon-to-acquire-abebooks/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">AbeBooks</a>&nbsp;(in 2008 for an undisclosed amount).



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h3>



“Amazon has an inventive, customer-obsessed, long-term oriented culture where entrepreneurs thrive,” an Amazon spokesperson said in an emailed statement to&nbsp;Forbes, adding the company helps those it acquires “to accelerate their businesses and delight customers with the help of Amazon’s resources and technology.” “We operate in a diverse range of businesses, from retail and entertainment to consumer electronics and technology services, and have thriving, well-established competition in each of these areas,” the spokesperson noted.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-chief-critic">CHIEF CRITIC</h3>



Amazon and other tech giants’ acquisition practices have been criticized by lawmakers, who have accused the companies of practicing anti-competitive behavior by buying up smaller rivals. “As gatekeepers to the digital economy, these platforms enjoy the power to pick winners and losers, shake down small businesses, and enrich themselves while choking off competitors,” Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), who chairs the House Antitrust Subcommittee,&nbsp;<a href="https://cicilline.house.gov/press-release/cicilline-opening-statement-big-tech-antitrust-hearing" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;in his opening statement for a hearing concerning Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google. “Their ability to dictate terms, call the shots, upend entire sectors, and inspire fear represent the powers of a private government.” Amazon has&nbsp;<a href="https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/policy-news-views/statement-by-jeff-bezos-to-the-u-s-house-committee-on-the-judiciary" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">denied</a>&nbsp;the antitrust allegations against it and maintains that it competes with other platforms like eBay, Etsy, Walmart and Target and brick and mortar stores worldwide, noting the platform’s sales make up less than 4% of U.S. retail.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h3>



Sources cited by the&nbsp;Journal&nbsp;say a deal between Amazon and MGM could be finalized as early as this week, though nothing has yet been finalized and “there are no guarantees they will ultimately reach an agreement.” Should the deal go through, MGM’s library would substantially bolster Amazon’s streaming platform by giving it access to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/amazon-acquire-mgm-1234954655/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">thousands</a>&nbsp;of additional film and television titles, helping Amazon Prime better compete with other streaming powerhouses like Netflix. MGM’s century-long history dates back to the silent era, giving Amazon access to films like the&nbsp;James Bond&nbsp;franchise and&nbsp;Rocky&nbsp;films and newer properties like&nbsp;The Handmaid’s Tale&nbsp;television series. (Golden Age classics made at the studio before 1948 like&nbsp;The Wizard of Oz&nbsp;and&nbsp;Gone with the Wind&nbsp;have already been sold to Warner Bros, however, the&nbsp;Journal&nbsp;notes.) The reported $9 billion deal comes after MGM was most recently valued at $5.5 billion in December, the&nbsp;Journal&nbsp;reports, though its stock price has soared in response to news of the expected deal.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h3>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2021/05/24/amazon-reportedly-close-to-buying-mgm-for-nearly-9-billion/?sh=74c23a063d4c">Amazon Reportedly Close To Buying MGM For Nearly $9 Billion</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-nears-deal-to-buy-hollywood-studio-mgm-11621880759" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Amazon Nears Deal to Buy Hollywood Studio MGM</a>&nbsp;(Wall Street Journal)



<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2021/amazon-apple-facebook-google-acquisitions/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">How Big Tech got so big: Hundreds of acquisitions</a>&nbsp;(Washington Post)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/dawnchmielewski/2021/01/30/mgms-back-on-the-block-and-floating-a-10-billion-price-tag-dont-count-on-it/?sh=7f1cb80eb740">MGM’s Back On The Block And Floating A $10 Billion Price Tag. Don’t Count On It.</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



By Alison Durkee, Forbes Staff

Amazon Package Deliveries On Prime Day

Amazon’s Biggest Acquisitions Have Allowed It To Become A Marketplace For Nearly Everything

TOPLINE Embattled co-working giant WeWork lost $2.1 billion and more than one in four of its customers during the first quarter, according to the Financial Times, as the coronavirus pandemic and a nine-figure settlement with former CEO Adam Neumann placed strain on the company as it prepares a second try at going public later this year.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h3>



The company’s&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/60ea2f72-586f-4f3e-b153-3455b93539b8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">revenue fell by half</a>&nbsp;compared to the first quarter last year, according to the&nbsp;FT, dropping from $1.1 billion to $598 million as it shed 200,000 customers, accounting for roughly a quarter of its membership.



The first-quarter losses also include Neumann’s settlement earlier this year, which saw the ousted founder walk away with about&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-softbank-group-wework-settlement/softbank-announces-settlement-with-former-wework-ceo-neumann-idUSKBN2AQ34U?il=0" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">$500 million</a>, according to media reports.



WeWork outspent itself as the company shuttered unprofitable locations: Between the first quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of 2021,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/60ea2f72-586f-4f3e-b153-3455b93539b8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">restructuring-related costs</a>&nbsp;swelled from $56 million to $494 million, according to the&nbsp;FT.



WeWork hopes the one-time expenses to unload locations will help the company meet its goal of profitability, and told potential investors in March that&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/60ea2f72-586f-4f3e-b153-3455b93539b8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">annual revenues would soar</a>&nbsp;as coronavirus infections slow down, estimating that the company would go from earning $3.2 billion in 2020 to a staggering $7 billion by 2024, according to the&nbsp;FT.



The firm’s tough quarter comes as new CEO Sandeep Mathrani&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/60ea2f72-586f-4f3e-b153-3455b93539b8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">cuts costs</a>&nbsp;to prepare for a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/03/26/wework-will-go-public-via-spac-deal-at-9-billion-valuation-less-than-20-of-its-2019-softbank-valuation/?sh=1f838fc234eb">second shot at going public</a>&nbsp;later this year via a SPAC merger with BowX Acquisition Corp.



WeWork said the company would be valued at $9 billion, including debt, with the SPAC deal that would include&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/03/26/wework-will-go-public-via-spac-deal-at-9-billion-valuation-less-than-20-of-its-2019-softbank-valuation/?sh=1f838fc234eb">a $483 million investment</a>&nbsp;from BowX.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h3>



WeWork’s first-quarter cash fall is only the latest stumbling block for the company. In 2019, WeWork’s first attempt at going public failed after the company pulled its<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2019/09/17/wework-delays-20-billion-ipo-as-valuation-plunges/?sh=7c8644cb58ff">&nbsp;$20 billion initial public offering</a>&nbsp;at the last second, sending the valuation tumbling. Neumann stepped down later in 2019, and sued the company he founded the following year after SoftBank, WeWork’s largest shareholder, tried to back out of a $3 billion deal to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelsandler/2021/02/26/wework-founder-adam-neumann-softbank-reach-settlement-in-legal-battle/?sh=d78fb6379e70">buy WeWork shares</a>&nbsp;from Neumann and other early employees. In 2021, the coronavirus pandemic and ensuing lockdowns battered the company even further as much of the world’s workforce worked from home.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h3>



<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/60ea2f72-586f-4f3e-b153-3455b93539b8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">WeWork loses $2.1bn and a quarter of its members as lockdowns bite</a>&nbsp;(Financial Times)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/03/26/wework-will-go-public-via-spac-deal-at-9-billion-valuation-less-than-20-of-its-2019-softbank-valuation/?sh=1f838fc234eb">WeWork Will Go Public Via SPAC Deal At $9 Billion Valuation—Less Than 20% Of Its 2019 SoftBank Valuation</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelsandler/2021/02/26/wework-founder-adam-neumann-softbank-reach-settlement-in-legal-battle/?sh=5899c67279e7">WeWork Founder Adam Neumann, Softbank Reach Settlement In Legal Battle</a> (Forbes)



By Carlie Porterfield, Forbes Staff

WeWork Presents Creator Awards Global Finals At The Theater At Madison Square Garden – Inside

WeWork Reportedly Lost More Than $2 Billion In 1st Quarter

A traditional, informal means of saving, stokvel investment societies continue to bind communities in South Africa and is a multi-billion dollar industry. Their capital is trust, and their currency a central fund that spawns new opportunities.

In this house in Centurion in Johannesburg on a winter afternoon, there’s song, food, camaraderie and joy. And one common component that binds the women: stokvels.
For most South Africans honoring the traditional mode, this is the word synonymous with savings schemes that they have come to trust over generations.
And like this meet we are witness to today, it stands for a union in which a group of people who know and trust each other enter into an agreement to contribute a fixed amount of money towards a common pool.
The group of people we are meeting are the Akanani Sisters, stokvel members who occasionally come together, bantering over a hot meal and listening to music.
“The whole purpose of the stokvel is so that we may come together as ladies and mothers made of different age groups, so we may build and advise one another on life matters. It is not just about collecting money, we cry and laugh together,” says Bahedile Mooke, one of the members.
Stokvels, the traditional South African savings scheme with 11.5 million members in 810,000 groups contributing R50 billion ($3.76 billion) annually to the economy, is often overlooked.
“If you speak of something that is outside of that framework, then that is something else,” says Mizi Mtshali, the Chief Executive Officer of the National Stokvel Association of South Africa (NASASA).
The Akanani Sisters stokvel was formed in 2015 by three family members who gathered on a monthly basis. The group, however, is not registered with NASASA and does not save their money through financial institutions. However, they are looking at registering with NASASA as a precautionary step.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-37025 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-683x1024.jpg" alt="" width="683" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958-768x1151.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokvel-958.jpg 1366w" sizes="(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" />
<blockquote>“We got tired of meeting only when there were funerals, so we decided to start a small stokvel even if it was just for groceries,” says Sibongile Motsoeneng, treasurer of the Akanani Sisters.</blockquote>
This afternoon, they are six professionals from Johannesburg who are close friends.
“Society forces you to always put money aside – I don’t play around when money has to be paid, because we all want to be happy at the same time,” says Motsoeneng.
The monthly premium for the stokvel is R1,300 ($98) for which R500 ($37.6) is set aside towards groceries and rest distributed among the members at the end of each year.
“Our groceries are not like other stokvels, where you see them buy maize meal in large quantities. We buy groceries as per our personalized everyday needs. So the grocery would last us for about six months and one would just add on meat and other small things on a monthly basis,” says Motsoeneng.
In addition to their stokvel, they contribute a R300 ($22.5) towards each other’s birthdays for buying presents, and R2,000 ($151) for their occasional weekend holiday trips.
Nonzolo Soldati, the chairperson of the stokvel, says they drew up a constitution which dictates the size of the contributions, when the accumulated money is to be paid out, and the roles and responsibilities of the members that have to be abided by.
“If you fail to pay your monthly premiums for more than three months, that would mean you forfeit your portion of your groceries and savings at the end of the year. Also, if you fail to attend the monthly gatherings, you are fined R50 ($3.76),” says Soldati.
“We used to deposit the money in the bank, but now we no longer do so because of the exorbitant bank charges,” says Soldati.
Through these stokvels, the members’ lives have changed, as they are not unduly stressed by financial woes come January. Their finances are in order and they also don’t feel the pinch of food price hikes through the year.
Apart from the groceries they purchased last year, they each saved R17,000 ($1,280), which is nothing unusual, according to Mtshali.
<blockquote>“On average in South Africa, a stokvel consists of 20 participants and they can save [as much] R50,000 ($3,765),” says Mtshali.</blockquote>
Investing in stokvels is not without risk however. Unlike the formal financial institutions, the only security members can bank on is trust. As a result of its unregulated nature, fraud in stokvels is common.
Ask one of the Akanani Sisters members, Bongiwe Mncube, who lost all her money. She was scammed in a burial society in Kempton Park.
“We lost two people [to death] in our community in the space of two months. That is when we realized that all the money we were ‘putting away’ was not there,” says Mncube.
They were able to pay for the burial of the first bereavement, but when it came to the second, they were scraping for funds.
“We last knew that we had money, but when we went to check the bank statement, we were surprised to find out that money was not being deposited for a couple of months. So I walked away because I had no leg to stand on,” says Mncube.
Mtshali says such stories are the reason why stokvel associations must register with NASASA so they can check the legitimacy of such societies. So, should the unthinkable happen one day, the participant is able to press criminal charges.
The word stokvels is believed to have originated from the term ‘stock fair’ used to describe auctions run by English settlers in the 19th century, but as the industry is becoming the leading form of savings and investment in South Africa, it is referred to in multiple ways, such as social clubs, gooi-goois, investment clubs, kuholisana, and makgotlas. The stokvels available vary according to the needs of the members.
“As much as there are holiday stokvels and property, social and party clubs, but grocery, burial society and saving clubs are still the most dominant,” says Mtshali.
Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes have also camouflaged as stokvels.
“What has happened over the years is that a lot of operators have started abusing the word stokvels…They use that word to attract customers for whatever product they are looking to sell,” says Mtshali.
While stokvels may seem like an informal way of making money, it is serious business. Members do their homework, deliberate about which companies to invest in and make investment decisions. And the best part about it is knowing there may be a financial windfall one day. It’s cash that is built on trust and binds communities.
<h3>Stokvel Homes?</h3>
<div id="attachment_37023" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37023" class="size-medium wp-image-37023" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-768x1151.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nicholas-261.jpg 1366w" sizes="(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />Nicolas Manyike</div>
Nicolas Manyike’s property stokvel leads to new investment opportunities.
Land ownership is a burning topic in South Africa, which is why publicist and businessman Nicolas Manyike founded Property Stokvel Investment, a stokvel that aims to buy and rent out properties, encouraging black people to be property owners.
Manyike, who grew up poor in the Mpumalanga province of South Africa, watched his mother struggle with accommodation, yet she was a member of various grocery stokvels.
“My mother was in a lot of grocery stokvels and we would eat up all the food, then the struggle would continue. So I always thought ‘how about we use the same concept but for something that has long-term benefits for us as a black community’,” says Manyike.
He decided to rework the stokvel model to have long-term benefits.
“We need to shift our mind-set around stokvels,” he says.
He worked on his idea, through drafting the constitution and coming up with the two phases that will create the members enough capital to be able to purchase land.
“The first phase is to get 100 members that would contribute R2,100 ($158). The R100 (7.52) is for administration purposes. So that we could accumulate R1 million ($75,300) in 10 months that we will use to purchase property, or a franchise that will create profit for the members,” says Manyike.
It is only in the second phase that individual property will be bought for each member.
Manyiko says that ownership of the house will be registered in the stokvel’s name until all participants are house-holders within two years.
Property Stokvel Investment currently has over 80 members and is not registered with NASASA. Manyike believes stokvels do not need to be registered as they are self-regulating.
“All stokvels in South Africa are self-regulated. NASASA is more focused on grocery stokvels. We are bound by our constitution,” he says.
“We are banking with Nedbank as a club account and we have a committee, once we have a 100 members we will increase the number of people in the committee,” says Manyike.
Purchasing property in South Africa is a struggle due to increasing home loans and interest. Could stokvels be the future of acquiring property?
<h3>Download A Stokvel</h3>
<div id="attachment_37024" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37024" class="size-medium wp-image-37024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Stokfella-129.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Tshepo Moloi</div>
Tshepho Moloi says he has championed the future of stokvels.
Imagine being a stokvel member and never having to meet? Well, that is what the future of stokvels looks like based on an app designed by Tshepho Moloi, the founder of StokFella.
“Most businesses are bought out of frustration of people saying that we could do better. I wanted to start an investment stokvel but the administration behind it was a bit of a headache,” says Moloi.
Moloi went home to Soweto, where he grew up, and observed a burial stokvel that was in existence for two years and had developed into an investment and grocery stokvel.
“I found out that the common problem is maladministration… So that is how the birth of StokFella came about,” he says.
StokFella, is a smartphone-based app that seeks to help stokvels organize, manage, communicate and be more efficient in growing their wealth.
“By doing that, it gives them access to economic opportunities. So they grow from point A to point B,” Moloi says.
In just two years, the app has 5,000 active members and is user-friendly for all age groups and LSMs.
“When stokvels want to be endorsed by us, they need to come to our offices so that we may conduct due diligence on them. However, those that just want to use the app could just download it,” says Moloi.
The main challenge StokFella faced during its initial stages was with the paperwork of regulatory laws and reaching the right market.
“But I am happy to have championed the future of stokvels. Honestly, it is not a unique solution but our implementation is how we have been able to get far,” he says.
“If 10 years from now, we still have a R49 billion ($3.69 billion) industry, then we have not done our job!” says Moloi.
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Stokvel-943

The Social Capital of Stokvels

The three hours I spent interviewing Terry Paine were steeped in the blood and sweat of the game. They were the kind of conversations rare in football these days – like the benefits of learning ball control with a tennis ball on the streets. It was football with laughter – full of the human frailties exposed by the beautiful game; rather than the vogue, yet false, notion of it as a cross between an academic subject and a computer game.
Paine is the sort of player that England used to be famous for: passionate about the game, down-to-earth, with that openness and innate decency born of growing up in a small town – Winchester, just north of Southampton in Hampshire. It is only that steely glint in his piercing blue eyes that reminds you that you wouldn’t stand a chance in a rough 50/50 tackle.
The bright sunshine on this winter morning, at a table outside an airy Rivonia café in Johannesburg, contrasts with a journey back to the dark days of vicious tackles on mud heaps amid the smokestacks and factories of industrial England. This is where Paine honed his craft as one of the fastest, toughest, trickiest and most enduring wingers England ever produced. He played 19 times for England, scoring seven goals, remarkably as a second division player. Paine won a World Cup in 1966, earned an MBE from the Queen and scores of scars along the way.
“In those days any tackle below the neck was allowed,” he chuckles. “But I never got seriously injured because I could jump.”
Paine’s trade as a professional footballer built a career that straddles the foggy days of bleak, windswept, terraces, where the fans had cigarettes in their hands instead of cell phones, to the glossy, money mad, 21st century game. He played 713 games for Southampton, the club where he began as a wide-eyed teenager, scoring 160 goals in 18 years.
The Premier League club made him honorary president, in 2012, and flies him from Africa for games in another world to the rough, tough one he knew at Southampton. In Paine’s playing days, a pre-match meal was steak, chips, a cup of tea and a slice of toast. In those days there were five people, including the manager, working at the club – now there are 300.
<blockquote>“What you have got to remember is it is business now, and big business. The sport is no longer the sport you and I knew and loved.”</blockquote>
At Southampton’s St Mary’s Stadium there is a swimming pool next to the dressing room with underwater cameras so physiotherapists can study injuries. The club uses special soap powder for washing the kit that reduces the chance of allergies or rashes. Every day, doctors swab the mouths of the players to see whether they are sick.
“If you sneeze nowadays they don’t play you – the medical side has really taken over. The big question is why are players getting so many injuries with all the modern equipment and pitches you’d want to carpet your front room with? No one can work it out.”
St Mary&#8217;s Stadium is a carpeted, cosseted world with one of the best youth academies in Europe that has produced a string of internationals, including Adam Lallana, Theo Walcott, Gareth Bale, Wayne Bridge and Luke Shaw.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2017/08/04/neymar-signs-psg-set-become-worlds-highest-paid-soccer-player-ahead-messi-ronaldo/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Neymar Signs With PSG, Set To Become World&#8217;s Highest-Paid Player Ahead Of Messi And Ronaldo</a>
When Paine was a talented 16-year-old playing for Winchester City, in the 1950s, there was no such thing as an academy. His father was a welder for British Rail and the young Paine spent a year as an office runner there before signing up for an apprenticeship in the body building shop in Eastleigh, a few miles out of Southampton, constructing railway carriages.
“I would have made the worst body builder, I was absolutely useless; football came to my rescue there,” laughs Paine.
<div id="attachment_33050" style="width: 264px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-33050" class=" wp-image-33050" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/525723610-225x300.jpg" alt="" width="254" height="338" />Terry Paine gets presented to the crowd, during the World Cup qualifier between England and Andorra, as one of the members of the winning squad of the 1966 World Cup (Photo by AMA/Corbis via Getty Images)</div>
It was a colleague in the railway body shop that proved the catalyst for Paine’s career. Arsenal called  Paine to London for a trial and a fellow worker, a die-hard Southampton fan, phoned club manager Ted Bates to say he was about to miss out on what the newspapers, these days, would call a teenage sensation. What followed could have led to a court case in the uptight world of modern football.
“Ted Bates got in myself and another player, Colin Holmes, and locked the office door and said he wouldn’t open until we signed. Time was getting on and we were both starving so we signed just to get out.”
Bates sent a cheque for £25 to Winchester City to seal the transfer. Paine’s signing on fee was £10. He spent it on a bright red jersey on one of his first games for the reserves, in the Hampshire League, against Cowes on the Isle of Wight.
Money was scarce for the players, even though most clubs were pulling crowds in tens of thousands. The maximum wage was £20 in the winter and £17 in the summer; it wouldn’t have mattered if you had the dash of Ronaldo, you could have been paid the same as a loyal, lumbering, defender for Sheffield Wednesday.
“We always hoped we would play Ipswich just before Christmas because the Cobbold family that owned the club used to give all the players a turkey. In those days we struggled to buy a chicken for Christmas,” Paine recalls.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2017/06/12/fanon-soccer-radically-anti-capitalist-anti-commercial-anti-bourgeois/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Fanon on soccer: radically anti-capitalist, anti-commercial and anti-bourgeois</a>
This penury was one of the reasons hundreds of English footballers agreed to go on strike in January 1961. The vote among the members of the newly-formed Professional Footballers’ Association – the trade union for players – was 694 for and 18 against.
Paine and his Southampton teammates went to the pub across the road from the ground and voted 8-7 in favor of the strike to be staged on January 14, 1961. The Football League held firm saying removing the maximum wage would send many clubs to the wall. But the league caved in and, on January 18, the maximum wage was lifted.
“They could see the damage it was going to cause; it was no skin off their nose because it was the clubs that had to pay,” says Paine.
One of the first to cash in was the late <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/2005/oct/20/newsstory.sportobituaries" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Johnny Haynes</a>, who played for Durban City in South Africa near the end of his career, the then captain of Fulham and England. His chairman and music hall comedian Tommy Trinder, as many believe in a publicity stunt, said he would pay Haynes £100 a week if the maximum wage was lifted. The day after, Haynes was in the boardroom and got his money.
Paine got his money too – £35 a week and spent his heavier pay packet on a Renault Dauphine, even though he couldn’t drive.
“The chief of police, who was a Southampton supporter, phoned the club and said: ‘Tell Terry Paine to pass his test, we know he is driving and doesn’t have a licence’. Weeks later, I passed.”
Innocent times maybe. But even then the big clubs were winking at corruption. It is still referred to as “tapping up” – the illegal approach to players without the knowledge of their club.
One summer a manager, from one of the big clubs up north, knocked at Paine’s door in Winchester.
“He pops up outside my house and says: ‘Oh Terry, I was on holiday down here and I thought I would come and see you’,” chuckles Paine.
Tottenham Hotspur, and its assistant manager Harry Evans, couldn’t leave Paine alone. Manager Bill Nicholson looked to strengthen his side, in the 1960/61 season, as it strove to become the first club in the 20th century to do the league and cup double.
“Harry Evans would be waiting outside at away games, whispering in my ear. It was all illegal but nowadays they have agents so it doesn’t matter.”
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2016/12/01/gifted-ghanaian-stranded-middle-england/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Gifted Ghanaian Stranded In Middle England</a>
Football agents and their vast fees they charge stick in Paine’s craw, as well as mine. Money that could keep a score of lower division clubs afloat. On this morning there is uproar in the English newspapers about the agent of Manchester United player, Paul Pogba, who charged £41 million to handle the move from Juventus.
“It probably took a few phone calls and a couple of meetings,” says Paine as he shakes his head.
<blockquote>“A line has to be drawn… All the clubs must get together and say ‘right we are going to cap this, don’t pay more than £20 million in a deal. But you know it’s a business now and the agents will say ‘if you don’t want to do the deal, we will go to Real Madrid’.”</blockquote>
Paine was one of the pathfinders for the highly-paid, sports car-driving, product-endorsing footballer of today. He first came to South Africa with fellow World Cup winner Bobby Charlton’s guest team, in 1979, and made his home in Johannesburg, in 1984, where he was offered a job as a football coach. These days he is a football pundit for a sports TV channel and often comments on players at the highest level, with half his talent, who earn more in a month than he did in more than 20 years.
“That’s always difficult; you have to be careful not to over criticize. You always try to give your honest opinion.”
His final verdict on the money-dominated business that is football?
“If I was playing now I would be a multi-millionaire… I think the players I played with would have thrived in the modern era – I wonder whether modern players would have thrived in our era?”
Spot on, from the king of the pin-point cross.

The Day Football Crossed To Business

Time may have aged the face that conned millions, in a cloud of fraudulent cheques, but Frank Abagnale is as sharp and up-to-the-minute as ever on the shady world of fraud.
Abagnale, one of the world’s best known imposters, reckons that technology makes it a thousand times easier to be a conman.
“Today, I would have stolen $20 million easily. Back then, for me to produce a cheque would require a great deal of skill and time. Today, in just a few minutes, you can design a cheque on your laptop, go to a company’s website, check their logo and put it on a cheque. Capture the bank’s logo and put it on a cheque, and if you get a copy of the company’s annual report, on page three is a signature of the chairman of the board,” says Abagnale.
His smooth, charming tone that fooled bank tellers all over the world, assures me that Leonardo DiCaprio’s portrayal of him in the movie Catch Me If You Can has nothing on the real Frank Abagnale story in the 1960s.
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“I was 16 years old when I ran away from a broken home. The judge told me I had to choose between my mother and father (who had just divorced) and I ran away and ended up in the streets of New York City,” says Abagnale.
Out on the streets, his first task was to appear older. Abagnale altered his driver’s licence to make himself 10 years older. That was the first step to writing about $2.5 million in bad cheques before he was 21.
In this, Abagnale impersonated an airline pilot, a doctor, a lawyer and a university lecturer before being caught by the French police. The newspapers called him the Skyway Man as he used his pilot guise to fly for free on his way to paper the world with dud cheques. There was time in French and Swedish prisons before extradition to the United States, where he was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison; he served four.
“When I was 26, the government offered to take me out of prison on the condition that I go work for them for the rest of my sentence, until my parole expired. I agreed and now I have spent about four decades with the FBI in Washington DC,” he says.
Abagnale is a world expert on fraud who now lectures and consults for financial institutions, corporations and government agencies around the world. He mentions Russia and China as hotspots for cybercrime.
Nigeria is also on Abagnale’s list. He talks about how Nigerian conmen have progressed.
“Twenty years ago, Nigerians had all these scams where they’d write these letters with counterfeited postage stamps and they’d send thousands of them out hoping for 1 or 2 percent response. Today there is no letters. They send out millions of emails and all they have to do is hope that less than 1 percent responds to their emails and they’re going to make millions of dollars.”
Abagnale warns that the most common Nigerian email, right now, is from the ‘internal revenue office’ stating that the recipient owes taxes that need to be paid back within five days. When the recipient calls to enquire, they inform them that they can pay immediately using their credit cards, hoping people will hand over their numbers.
”When one thing wears out and people get used to that, they just come up with another idea,” says Abagnale.
Even Facebook and Twitter can be tools in cybercrime.
“If you’re on Facebook and you display when you were born and have a portrait style picture of yourself, I’m 98% [on my way to] stealing your identity. There’s technology called PittPatt which allows me to take your picture at the airport and in 7.5 seconds I’ll be at your Facebook page through facial recognition from the photo on your Facebook. Now if we have it, criminals have that technology as well,” says Abagnale.
With all the information criminals can find on Facebook alone, it would be wise to play it safe, he says.
According to Abagnale, it’s wiser to alter your date of birth slightly on social media platforms.
“I would never put a straight photograph of myself on social media. I’d post a picture of me with a group of friends or me playing tennis or volleyball or some sport activity where it’s not a straight on photograph.”
Wise words from a sharp-eyed, smooth talking, poacher turned gamekeeper.

Con Me  If You Can

They are fresh-faced, full of ambition and look like they could be on their way to a rock concert—instead, they are on their way to a fortune.
In just 14 months, they’ve managed to beat the odds, and their peers, to amass just over $385 million in assets in a $19-billion property market in South Africa.
Sesfikile Capital, which means “we have arrived” in Xhosa, is a young company in more ways than one. Evan Jankelowitz is the eldest, aged 32, Mohamed Kalla, 29, and Kundayi Munzara, 28.  Together they’ve beaten the benchmark of the property business, the South African Property Index, in times of recession and doubt.
Sesfikile Capital, which opened its doors in December 2010, manages institutional capital on behalf of pension fund clients in domestic and international property listings.
It wasn’t easy. In the first four months of their business, they had zero assets to manage.
“We used to look at our monthly statements and we had an expense statement, not an income statement! April 2011 is when we got our first mandate, which was $1.2 million—not a great deal, but at least that gave us the ability to start,” says Munzara.
If that was a surprise—10 months later came a shock. Sesfikile Capital had set a target of $257 million for the first year; instead they got $385 million. The company has reaped the benefits of property coming into its own as an asset and pension funds also started to pay a lot more attention to listed property.
“It’s by no means a pushover sector and we have sleepless nights when the markets don’t always go our way; but the truth of the matter is we’re so involved and enjoy what we do. It’s a challenge we’re up for,” says Jankelowitz.
“It’s also difficult in this sector because it’s small and relatively illiquid. There’s a lot of competition out there, so you have to work pretty hard to beat the average,” Kalla adds.
South African property economist Professor François Viruly says Sesfikile Capital’s portfolio is a substantial one to be created in such a short time. He says there are significant bargains to be had in the property market in South Africa and the launching of new property funds offers good opportunities.
Sesfikile Capital says making sense of what is happening globally is another issue they face. The constant news flow on the euro zone and other global political issues affect equity markets and is something they’ve come to work prepared for every day.
The South African commercial property market has adjusted from its peak in 2005 and 2006. The focus at present is on maintaining tenants and keeping operating costs under control. But the number of new players entering the South African market reflects the opportunities here and further afield.
“If you think of the big oil countries like Angola, Ghana and Nigeria, for instance, there’s a big shortage of stock there. So at this point, the stock actually has to be built. And the guys who are really doing that are probably the infrastructure and private equity funds; we’re more a second-round investor, where we invest in existing stock that provides rental,” Munzara says.
Viruly says a slowdown in returns should be expected in 2012, reflective of relatively high vacancies in the commercial property market. There is also some pressure on rentals at the moment and the focus of property managers is to ensure that incomes are maintained. The rise in municipal rates and taxes and the rising cost of electricity are also having an impact on returns in the property market.
Sesfikile Capital is ready for rough waters, though.
“The volatility in equity markets has seen pension funds and investors look towards more income-driven assets and both fixed-income and property have actually benefitted from that. And there is very little evidence to suggest that investment in property has actually been hampered by the recession,” Kalla says.
“It reshuffled the whole market and allowed for cheaper entries into property. I’ve personally seen a lot more pension funds looking at this space—there has been more focus on property than there has been in the past,” Jankelowitz adds.
South African property continues to demonstrate relatively strong performance when compared to equities and bonds, according to Viruly. The densification of South African cities continues to offer opportunities, especially in the retail and residential sectors.
Sesfikile Capital has just launched a unit trust, which will focus on the retail market and invest in the listed property sector. The company is launching a global fund as well.
“Our numbers are looking good and there’s no reason to think we can’t continue in this manner,” says Jankelowitz.
The young lions appear ready to roar.

Tag: millions

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