Partnering with the International Finance Corporation

Nimble officially partnered with the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in December 2019 to focus on the acquisition and resolution of distressed assets in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa. The IFC has taken an equity stake in our business and provided significant capital to acquire distressed assets — a relationship that is expected to be transformative for Nimble.

The IFC supports the development of strong distressed-asset markets in emerging economies to ensure economic growth and financial stability through its Distressed Asset Recovery Program (DARP), which has been successfully implemented in South America, Eastern Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Non-performing loan (NPL) transactions are globally accepted as a cornerstone of healthy financial markets because they simultaneously address challenges faced by both credit-granting institutions and over-indebted customers.

Through the DARP initiative, credit grantors can sell their NPLs, freeing up capital to reinvest in their core operations. At the same time, credit rehabilitation and repair take place for individuals and SMEs, as outstanding debt obligations are sensibly resolved — preserving assets while allowing customers to re-enter the financial system as credit-active participants.

Customer-centricity and financial rehabilitation underpin Nimble’s approach to resolving debt obligations. Debt forgiveness is one of the key tools used to achieve this balance, resolving unmanageable debts while generating meaningful socio-economic benefits. In an earlier article on our website (May 2019), we discussed both legislated debt-forgiveness frameworks and the large-scale debt relief achieved naturally through free-market NPL sales.

The economic crisis resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic has increased customer indebtedness across South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa. As the economy slows, credit extension contracts, business liquidity suffers, and unemployment rises, putting pressure on credit grantors whose balance sheets and capital adequacy are strained by higher NPL levels.

Our partnership with the IFC provides Nimble Group with access to organised capital and the ability to deliver practical solutions to credit grantors — addressing income-statement, balance-sheet, and other crisis-related challenges. At the forefront of our investment philosophy is a commitment to treating customers fairly while achieving sustainable credit rehabilitation and market stability throughout sub-Saharan Africa.

Written by: Peter Watson, Nimble Group Head of Investing