Tharisa just swapped its offtake partner for a bigger, more strategic dance partner, and the market should like the choreography. From 1 January 2027, Valterra Platinum — via Rustenburg Platinum Mines — will buy 50% of Tharisa Mine's PGM concentrate on comparable terms, replacing Sibanye-Stillwater, while Northam keeps its 50%. It's a binding multi-year agreement that locks in offtake certainty, and it extends the broader Valterra cooperation already signed for the Karo Platinum project. The kicker is the chrome collaboration: Valterra will evaluate Tharisa's proprietary Vulcan X fine-chrome recovery technology, with the pilot plant complete and testing under way. That's Tharisa monetising its innovation rather than just selling rock — a business model upgrade, not a commodity trade.
For shareholders who bought the dips, this is confirmation of the thesis: Tharisa is no longer just a PGM miner, it's a technology-and-beneficiation story that happens to sit on a multi-generational orebody. Karo remains the big swing factor — Phase 1 is designed to more than double group PGM production to ~226koz — and having Valterra (a serious downstream processor) tied to both the existing mine and Karo de-risks the growth story materially. The stock trades at a miserly 3.9x earnings with a 0.51 price-to-book. At R26.05, off the 2026 highs but up from August's R26.50-area lows, Tharisa remains one of the cheapest quality production stories on the JSE. BULLISH — offtake certainty plus a technology upside kicker.
A credit rating reaffirmation is usually a non-event — but this one carries real information. Fitch kept Sirius at BBB, investment grade, with a stable outlook, and the rationale is more interesting than the badge. EBITDA net interest cover of around 7x, net debt to EBITDA around 6x, like-for-like rental growth outpacing inflation, and — the new flavour — roughly €200 million of defence-related assets in Germany after the Kiel and Fulda acquisitions, with Fitch expecting increased defence spending to support tenant retention and demand. In a world where European property is fretting about rates and refinancing, Sirius is the boring, well-run story that keeps its promises.
This matters for the dividend: an investment-grade REIT with its bonds upsized to €500m each at rates 'well below portfolio yields' can keep paying and growing its distribution without sweating refinancing windows. Sirius remains the standout listed way to play German business parks — a market that's structurally undersupplied. At R20.26 the stock isn't the screaming bargain it was in 2022, but a ~7% dividend underpinned by a fortress balance sheet and a defence tailwind is a perfectly good place to rest capital. BULLISH — boring, but boring in the way that pays you.
Mondi's third quarter is a tale of two numbers. Headline underlying EBITDA came in at €196m, up from €167m in Q2 — but strip out the forestry fair value line (Q2 carried a -€43m loss, Q3 was nil) and earnings actually fell sequentially, hit by planned maintenance shuts and, more importantly, energy and wood costs that rose faster than expected. The market read it loud and clear: the shares fell nearly 10% on the update. Good order books and positive pricing momentum are nice, but when input costs run ahead of price increases, the margin story goes backwards. Mondi says further price hikes for paper grades were announced with benefit expected 'towards the end of this year and into 2027' — a promise of future relief, not present comfort.
Management's tone is characteristically calm — 'resilient performance against a backdrop of rising input costs' — and the portfolio moves are sensible: selling converting plants, transferring volumes, optimising the footprint. Packaging remains structurally attractive, and Corrugated Packaging is squeezing pricing through. But with SA diesel prices and European energy still volatile, the fourth quarter guidance of nil forestry gains means the earnings engine stays under pressure. At R163.29 (down from R172 at last review on 12 October), Mondi is a quality compounder paying you to be patient through a cost cycle. NEUTRAL — the strategy is right, the timing is wrong.
PSG Financial Services keeps doing what it does: compounding quietly and paying you to wait. Recurring headline earnings rose 5% to 60.9c per share, the dividend jumped 10% to 22c, assets under management grew 15% to R594.1 billion and return on equity sits at a fat 26.5%. And it did this in a market backdrop it openly calls 'much less favourable' — securities markets down, performance fees collapsing from 7.3% of headline earnings to just 1.9%. If that's a bad six months, investors should be licking their lips about a good one. PSG Wealth grew earnings 14%; even the storm-hit Insure division, battered by Western Cape weather, held up.
The magic is the advice-led model: PSG Wealth now manages R504.9 billion, up 12%, while PSG Asset Management grew a third to R89.2 billion. The management team keeps spending on tech and people (95 new graduates, fixed remuneration up 10%) — fully expensed, no capitalising nonsense — which is exactly what you want to see in a wealth manager. Capital cover of 292% and an affirmed AA-(ZA) rating mean the balance sheet is a fortress. At R29.04 the stock is not cheap on 21x earnings, but quality compounds. BULLISH — this is the sort of boring excellence that builds fortunes.
Fairvest is going shopping, and it's asking big money to come along. The group kicked off an accelerated book build to raise around R500 million in new B shares, with Java Capital running the book and a minimum ticket of R1 million for participants. The stated purpose: fund 'strategic retail acquisitions under negotiation'. For a REIT that has built a reputation as the canny buyer of South African convenience and community retail assets, a raise to fund deals at a time when retail property fundamentals are improving is a bullish signal — this is Fairvest deploying firepower when it sees value, not raising to plug a hole.
The fine print matters, as always: the raise is for B shares, pricing will be set by the book (likely a small discount to the current R19.70), and related parties may participate at the close price. Dilution is real, but for a fund trading at 22.8x earnings with a 15.9% ROE, the hope is the acquisitions are immediately accretive — and Fairvest's track record suggests management won't overpay for convenience retail they know cold. The risk is a book build that's priced greedily or deals that fail to close, leaving a cash pile with no yield. But you don't do an ABB after hours unless the sellers are serious. BULLISH — backed by a management team that has earned the benefit of the doubt.
Famous Brands is serving up a bitter meal: headline earnings per share between 252c and 205c — down as much as 13% — and reported EPS crashing by up to a third. The culprit is a R40.9m goodwill write-down on Retail Group in Botswana, where the group is bailing from 51% to 30% ownership. That's not an accounting accident; it's a confession that the Botswana bet underperformed badly. The group frames the move as 'capital-light expansion' — keep the master licence fees, keep a 30% toehold, stop bleeding operating losses. Fair enough, but a 33% earnings drop is a 33% earnings drop, and the market won't care that it's 'one-off' when the cheque clears next week.
The sad part is the underlying story is decent: revenue stayed resilient, and excluding the impairment EPS would have been 199c–247c, actually up on the 236c base. Higher fuel prices and interest rates squeezed margins, but the brand portfolio (Steers, Wimpy, Mugg & Bean) is holding up. The trouble is Famous Brands keeps finding ways to give back what operations earn — the Botswana retreat follows years of middling international returns. At R49.70 with results due 21 October, this is a share you watch, not chase. BEARISH until they prove they can stop stepping on rakes.
Equites has finally closed the book on Britain — and SA logistics investors should be cheering. The group disposed of the Aviva portfolio (GBP200.5m) and is marketing the last meaningful UK asset, DHL Leeds, with the proceeds earmarked for the real story: South African logistics. In the six months to August it pumped R600 million into SA developments and acquisitions, with six projects worth R2 billion on completion being built at yields on cost of 8%–9%. The interim distribution rose 5.1% to 72.57c and full-year guidance of 147.7–150.5c (5–7% growth) was reaffirmed. That's a REIT doing what REITs should: shrinking the risk, growing the income.
The balance sheet is the quiet star. LTV fell from 35.1% to 28.1%, there's R2.9 billion of cash and undrawn facilities, and vacancy is a microscopic 1.5% — in a market where offices are dying, industrial logistics space is king and Equites owns the throne. NAV per share grew 4.5% and distributable earnings were up 10.5%. The only ding is gross property revenue down 10.1% (the UK disposals), but that's the old business leaving, not the new one failing. At R18.15 with R650m raised at 90–103bp over swaps, growth is funded without begging. BULLISH — cleanest balance sheet in SA property.