Raymond Ndlovu, a former director of Prodigy Asset Management, launched empowerment financial service firm, Noah, this week in partnership with Mettle. The firm came to fruition through a joint initiative of Mettle Securities and a group of entrepreneurs led by Ndlovu.  Speaking on Classic Business on Monday, Ndlovu said: “There have been global developments that have led to people pointing a finger at the broking industry and we want to set about a different path.”The launch of Noah comes on the back of Standard Bank and an empowerment consortium’s joint initiative in the forming of Andisa Capital and empowerment group Jay & Jayendra’s venture with Old Mutual. Noah will initially focus on broking and structures, but will also offer services such as technical trading strategies and tactical research. Clyde Roussouw of Investec implied recently on Moneyweb’s Personal Finance Live that Mettle were cheats because the company does not pay tax, but the allegations don’t particularly perturb Ndlovu. In response, Ndlovu said that he thought that staff of Mettle were bright people and that he believed that they wouldn’t do anything outside the letter or the spirit of the law. He added that tax structuring in the company had brought about a lot of economic benefits to corporates and clients concerned. Ndlovu said that along with his partner Kevin Swart, they came up with the idea to re-brand, re-position and target Mettle Securities towards an agency-only business. The company, which was bought by Noah, was previously a proprietary broking operation.  Management and staff make-up of Noah are 90% from previously disadvantaged segments in the country.  Mettle on its own has a substantial empowerment shareholding, with the soon-to-delist Hosken Consolidated Investments holding more than 50% in the company.

Source: Moneyweb – Ron Derby