Who Founded Capitec?
Capitec Bank was established in 2001. Michiel le Roux served as its founding chief executive, while Riaan Stassen became the key builder of the bank’s early operating model and growth.
The short answer
Capitec Bank was established in 2001. The cleanest sourced description is that Michiel le Roux was the bank’s founding chief executive, with early backing associated with Jannie Mouton and PSG, while Riaan Stassen became the executive who built much of the operating model through the bank’s next phase. [1][2][3]
That distinction matters because Capitec’s history is not a simple single-founder story. Its own reports separate Le Roux’s founding leadership from Stassen’s later role in creating the bank “as we know it today”. [2][3]
Michiel le Roux and the founding period
Capitec’s 2008 annual report describes the bank as founded in 2001 and records the importance of Jannie Mouton and PSG as early supporters. Le Roux was the chief executive during the initial period. [1]
The 2019 integrated annual report records that Le Roux remained chief executive until 2004 and later chaired Capitec and Capitec Bank from 2007 to 2016. [2]
Riaan Stassen and the bank that followed
Stassen became the defining operating executive of Capitec’s early expansion. In 2010 the bank described him as the man who created Capitec Bank as it was then known. [3]
A twentieth-anniversary company account describes practical changes made during this period, including extended branch hours, simplified savings products and experiments with a mobile bank in 2005. [4]
Why founder and builder should be separated
Calling Stassen the sole founder would erase Le Roux’s documented founding-chief-executive role; calling Le Roux the only person who built Capitec would understate Stassen’s role in developing its operating model. The company’s own records support a two-stage account: founding under Le Roux, followed by a major building phase under Stassen. [2][3]
South African Index therefore links Capitec to both men while using different relationship labels: Le Roux as founder and founding chief executive, and Stassen as a major company builder and early chief executive. [2][3]
Sources
- Capitec Bank Holdings, Annual Report 2008, 2008-02-29. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩
- Capitec Bank Holdings, Integrated Annual Report 2019, 2019-02-28. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩
- Capitec Bank Holdings, Integrated Annual Report 2010, 2010-02-28. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩
- Capitec Bank, From 25 000 to 15 million clients: 20 years of Capitec Bank, 2021-03-01. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩