Shareholder revolt leaves Africa Bitcoin Corporation with two directors

Africa Bitcoin Corporation (ABC), South Africa’s listed Bitcoin treasury firm and financial services group, faces a new battle over who joins its board after four directors, including its chairperson and interim chief executive, resigned following a shareholder push to remove them.

With just two directors remaining, the company must rebuild its board while a separate demand to appoint two new non-executive directors remains unresolved.

The dispute centres on two shareholder demands. Investors holding approximately 76% of ABC’s shares called for the appointment of two new non-executive directors, a move the board opposed on governance grounds. A subsequent demand, backed by shareholders holding approximately 71.8% of the company’s shares, sought the removal of four existing directors.

All four have since resigned, making the removal resolutions unnecessary, but the original demand for two new appointments remains in force.

ABC now faces a governance test at a critical point in its transformation from a small-business financier into a Bitcoin treasury company. Shareholders have forced out most of its board, but the fight over who should replace them remains unsettled, raising questions about how the company will balance investor control, regulatory scrutiny, and independent oversight as it pursues its new strategy.

The four directors who resigned are Norma Sephuma, board chairperson; Stafford Masie, the company’s interim chief executive officer (CEO); and independent non-executive directors Snowy Masakale and GG Alcock. The company disclosed the departures in a Stock Exchange News Service (SENS) announcement on Monday, following the supplementary shareholder demand.

The departing directors said they had not taken the decision lightly, but that differences with WGW Capital Proprietary Limited, an ABC shareholder, had become irreconcilable.

“Recently, however, material differences emerged between the Board and WGW,” ABC said in the announcement.

The remaining directors are Robin Coode, an independent non-executive director, and Jonathan Phillips, the company’s financial director. They are working with the company’s advisers to restore the board and committee structures in line with statutory, regulatory, and JSE listing requirements.

Shareholder push for new directors

The dispute began with the demand for two additional directors, which the board addressed in an October 8 announcement. ABC acknowledged that shareholders had validly demanded a meeting under section 61(3) of the Companies Act, but said it did not support the proposed appointments at that time.

“The Board’s concern relates primarily to governance and regulatory integrity given the exceptional circumstances currently facing the Group,” ABC said.

The company stressed that its objection was not a general assessment of the candidates’ professional experience or capabilities. It committed to taking the necessary steps to convene the meeting and put the proposed resolutions to shareholders in accordance with applicable legal and regulatory requirements.

However, the announcement did not identify the proposed candidates, specify a meeting date, or provide further details about the board’s objections.

The original appointment demand remains unresolved. The two remaining directors must oversee the company while addressing the shareholder request and restoring the board’s composition.

Before its Bitcoin treasury pivot, the company listed as Altvest Capital on the Cape Town Stock Exchange (CTSE) in May 2022, initially valued at R50 million ($3 million). It later introduced three additional share classes—Class A for Umgani Lodge, Class B for Bambanani, and Class C for Altvest Credit Opportunities Fund (ACOF)—to raise funding for investments, but trading in its securities remained thin.

Figures published in its 2024 prospectus show just 42,420 ordinary shares changing hands between July 2023 and July 2024, generating about R131,031.05 ($7,948) in reported turnover.

Altvest moved its equity listing to the Johannesburg Stock Exchange’s (JSE) AltX Market in October 2024, citing limitations in the Cape Town exchange’s ability to attract retail investors and support sizeable capital raises. In May 2026, it transferred its shares to the JSE Main Board.

In 2025, ABC expanded beyond small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) lending to adopt Bitcoin as a long-term treasury asset, making its first disclosed purchase in February. Shareholders approved its rebrand from Altvest to Africa Bitcoin Corporation on September 10, 2025, with the new name and ticker taking effect on the JSE two weeks later.

Since then, the company has retained its SME financing business, while aggressively pushing its Bitcoin investment strategy for institutional investors seeking access to the cryptocurrency.

Deepening leadership crisis

The boardroom dispute comes amid a series of leadership changes following enforcement action by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA), South Africa’s financial services regulator, against three individuals associated with ABC, which previously operated as Altvest Capital.

The regulator found that former CEO Warren Wheatley, his wife Tatum Keshwar-Wheatley and former chief investment officer Akshay Karan manipulated Altvest shares in September 2022 to artificially inflate the share price and create a misleading impression of market demand and trading activity.

The three were fined a combined R9 million ($546,000) and debarred from the financial services industry for 20 years. The FSCA’s enforcement action was against the individuals, not ABC itself.

Wheatley has disputed the regulator’s findings, describing the transactions as three trades involving just 50 shares worth R301 ($18.26) that were intended to test the CTSE’s trading platform.

In a podcast interview with financial publication Moneyweb on October 9, Wheatley said those trades aimed to document pricing errors on the trading platform ahead of Altvest’s first public offering, disputing the regulator’s finding that they were part of a scheme to manipulate the share price for profit.

FSCA did not respond to a request for comment on its findings, the evidence supporting the market manipulation allegations, and the status of any appeals against its enforcement action.

In an email to TechCabal on September 8, Wheatley declined to comment, saying “none of the affected parties would be providing commentary” until their appeals are submitted.

In a September 1 SENS announcement, ABC said the affected individuals had informed the company that they disputed the findings and intended to seek reconsideration and suspension of the decisions before the Financial Services Tribunal, an independent body reviewing financial regulator decisions.

The Tribunal told TechCabal in September that it had not received applications for reconsideration or suspension involving the named parties at that time. Lwandiso Mgijima of the Financial Services Tribunal confirmed that no applications had been filed at the time.

“We confirm that the Tribunal has not received any applications for reconsideration or suspension involving the parties [Wheatley, Keshwar-Wheatley, and Karan] mentioned in your e-mail. The Tribunal is, accordingly, not in possession of any documents relating to the matter,” Mgijima said.

In a subsequent response to TechCabal, the Financial Services Tribunal confirmed that it received applications for reconsideration and suspension on September 25, 2026, after previously stating that no applications had been received. The matter, registered under case number A43/2026, lists Warren Gregory Wheatley, WGW Capital (Pty) Ltd, Tatum Lucy Wheatley, Tatum Keshwar Investments (Pty) Ltd, and Akshay Suresh Karan as applicants. The Tribunal said it had not yet ruled on the suspension application or set a hearing date.

“We confirm that applications for reconsideration and suspension involving the parties mentioned in your e-mail were received and processed by the Tribunal on 25 September 2026,” the Tribunal said. “We confirm that the Tribunal has not issued a ruling in respect of the suspension application. The process is ongoing.”

Wheatley, ABC’s co-founder and former CEO, resigned from the company with effect from September 21, 2026, after being placed on precautionary leave. Karan, who had also been placed on precautionary leave, resigned as chief investment officer with effect from October 1.

Masie took over as interim CEO after Wheatley was placed on precautionary leave. He has now also quit as interim CEO and director of Bitcoin Strategy, ABC’s Bitcoin investment subsidiary, with an intended final day of service of February 28, 2027.

ABC said Masie had agreed to continue fulfilling his executive responsibilities, supporting the management team, maintaining operational continuity and facilitating an orderly transition to permanent executive leadership.

Despite the board departures, ABC says its executive management team remains in place and will continue managing day-to-day operations within its existing lawful delegated authorities.

The company said its remaining directors, in consultation with its advisers, were addressing the steps needed to restore the appropriate board and committee composition.

Editor’s note: This article has been updated to include confirmation from the Financial Services Tribunal that it received applications for reconsideration and suspension. The case remains pending.

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Safaricom dismissed 118 employees for fraud in the year to March, even as fraud incidents fell 82%, pointing to a declining insider threat amid an intensified crackdown at Kenya’s largest telecoms operator.

The figure, disclosed in the company’s 2026 Sust a inable Business Report released on Tuesday at its Nairobi headquarters, is more than four times the 28 dismissals recorded in the year to March 2021. It equates to about 2% of the 5,648 people the report lists as employees.

Earlier disclosures put the tally at 95 in the year to March 2024 and 113 in the yea r to March 2025, so the climb has been steady rather than a one-off spike.

Insider conduct carries unusual weight at Safaricom as staff sit close to customer data, SIM registration and the agent network that moves money across M-PESA, Kenya’s dominant mobile-money platform. The report treats theft, falsifying company records, and unauthorised access to customer call records as gross misconduct that can result in dismissal.

“Our customers entrust us with their personal information, communications and financial transactions and expect our services to be secure, reliable and responsible,” Safaricom said in the report.

The report lists 118 fraud cases investigated and 118 dismissals, along with three disciplinary warnings, up from none the prior year. Referrals to law enforcement doubled from seven to 14. Fraud was the most common concern raised through Safaricom’s anonymous ethics hotline.

The rise comes as the company says its anti-fraud push is working. It cut fraud incidents by 82%, short of a 90% target, and recovered 46% of reported fraud losses. Monitoring and analytics also recovered KES 953 million ($7.4 million) linked to inflated agent commissions.

Safaricom said it moved from an investigation-led model to real-time detection covering internal, distributor and mobile-money fraud. The report does not break down dismissals by role, value internal losses, or say how many cases led to charges.

According to the report, fraud awareness training reached 5,643 people across staff, call centres, M-PESA, distributors and brand ambassadors, and 98% of employees completed the annual ethics programme.

Group Chief Risk Officer Nicholas Mulila said the company is committed to “embedding accountability across our operations.” Safaricom named in-person social engineering as the largest source of customer fraud.

The staff dismissals over fraud mirror what is happening in the banking industry, where sharper detection has also pushed dismissals higher. KCB Group, Kenya’s largest bank by assets, dismissed 60 staff for fraud in 2025, up from 34 in 2024, even as reported fraud incidents fell to 201 from 339, according to its sustainability report. Most of the 50 dismissals were in Kenya.

In May 2025, Equity Group’s chief executive officer, James Mwangi, said the lender had dismissed more than 1,200 employees after an audit of staff transactions, including personal M-PESA activity. Mwangi said the company would make such conduct audits a permanent practice, similar to performance appraisals.

Equity treated receiving money from customers as grounds for dismissal, a conflict-of-interest test wider than outright fraud. Safaricom’s figure covers only cases it investigated as fraud.

Outside finance, Kenya Power dismissed at least 20 employees over irregularities in the year to June 2025, including three who colluded with guards and drivers in a diesel-theft scheme that cost it KES 207.6 million ($1.5 million).

CANAL+ is struggling to turn around MultiChoice South Africa, the country’s biggest pay-TV operator, with revenue falling 3% in the nine months to September as lower subscription income weighed on performance.

The France-based media group is relying on revamped DStv packages and stronger content to reverse the decline. MultiChoice’s revenue fell 3% on a like-for-like basis to September 2026, according to CANAL+’s latest trading update released on Thursday.

The decline reflects underlying performance after adjusting for currency movements and changes in the scope of the business. On a reported basis, MultiChoice revenue rose 0.4% to €1.81 billion ($2.03 billion), benefiting from a material positive currency effect.

CANAL+ said the like-for-like decline was driven by lower subscription revenue in South Africa, partly offset by higher revenue in most other English-speaking African markets.

The decline moderated to 2% in the third quarter, from 3.4% in the first half. CANAL+ attributed part of the improvement to more favourable comparisons with the sporting events line-up in the previous year, rather than solely to the effects of its turnaround strategy.

The figures come as CANAL+ attempts to simplify MultiChoice’s offerings and strengthen the value proposition for subscribers following its acquisition of the South African pay-TV operator.

“We are making good progress with the MultiChoice turnaround plan,” CANAL+ chief executive officer (CEO) Maxime Saada said in the trading update. “In September, a new, simplified value proposition was launched in South Africa, providing subscribers with more content, greater choice, and better value for the same price.”

MultiChoice introduced the new packages on September 7, towards the end of the reporting period, leaving little time for their impact to reflect in the nine-month results. CANAL+ said the rollout would continue across English- and Portuguese-speaking African markets over the coming months.

The strategy comes amid wider changes to MultiChoice’s entertainment business, including the discontinuation of Showmax, MultiChoice’s subscription video streaming service, in April. CANAL+ has treated Showmax as a discontinued operation in its financial reporting.

The group has said it intends to continue investing in premium content, technology and strategic partnerships as it reshapes its entertainment offering. However, the latest trading update does not provide subscriber numbers or average revenue per user. This limits the available evidence on whether the changes are improving customer retention or spending.

At group level, CANAL+ reported revenue of €6.41 billion ($7.2 billion) for the nine months, up 37.5% from the same period last year. The increase primarily reflected the consolidation of MultiChoice following the acquisition, rather than equivalent growth in the underlying business.

On a like-for-like basis, group revenue declined 0.3%. Excluding MultiChoice, revenue increased 0.8% on a like-for-like basis, supported by French-speaking Africa and the group’s content production and distribution operations.

Africa and Asia revenue, including MultiChoice, rose 3.1% on a restated basis. But the figures conceal diverging performances across the continent: CANAL+’s Africa and Asia operations excluding MultiChoice recorded like-for-like revenue growth of 10.2%, while MultiChoice declined.

In French-speaking Africa, the group said subscriber growth was supported by a compelling content line-up and improved distribution efficiency. CANAL+ Telecom Africa, an African telecommunications and fibre broadband operator, also recorded double-digit revenue growth, driven by the expansion of its fibre-to-the-home network and stronger commercial momentum.

“We delivered a solid performance in the first nine months of the year as we continued to execute our strategy. Revenue was in line with our expectations, supported by strong momentum in French-speaking Africa and at STUDIOCANAL,” said Saada.

CANAL+ is also strengthening its sports offering to protect its position in the African entertainment market. The group secured exclusive rights to all UEFA men’s football club competitions across more than 40 countries for 2027 to 2031, alongside rights across Africa for the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations and its qualifying campaign.

CANAL+ said it remained on track to deliver its 2026 financial guidance, including €735 million ($825 million) in adjusted earnings before interest and tax and €250 million ($281 million) in targeted synergies measured by adjusted earnings before interest and tax.