Blackbullion, the financial wellbeing company for students, is moving into the South African market, through a new partnership with social impact enterprise, WaFunda. Cape Town based WaFunda delivers education, training, work and entrepreneurial programmes together with educational financing to young people.
Empowering young people with financial education
Blackbullion empowers young people to take control of their financial futures by delivering inclusive financial education, support and funding through its digital-first platform, rooted in financial wellbeing. To date, the award-winning scale-up has partnered with universities and colleges in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. The WaFunda partnership will see the fintech extend its reach to a wider audience of young people.
Blackbullion founder and CEO, Vivi Friedgut, explains, “Blackbullion seeks to be the premier financial brand for Gen Z. Our digital platform has been designed to provide just-in-time, comprehensive, high-quality learning, helping young people to make positive financial decisions. Financial education is a global need. We’re on a mission to make the world money smarter. The best way to deliver that is working with a local partner who shares that vision: we’re excited to support WaFunda in South Africa and beyond.”
Making money matters local
Through the partnership, students and young people working with WaFunda will have access to Blackbullion’s financial learning content, helping them to develop the essential money skills and confidence that ultimately underpin individuals’ success. From managing debt to budgeting, savings to investing, the topics remain global, while the content has been localised to ensure relevance and empathy.
Impact indicators for the platform are already coming through. A survey of 328 young people working with WaFunda through The Feenix Social Enterprise showed that students using Blackbullion scored themselves 25% higher on financial stability than counterparts not using the platform. What’s more, students felt that access to Blackbullion contributed more to their financial stability than monetary donations towards their education.
Leana de Beer, CEO of WaFunda adds, “As a social enterprise working with marginalised young people, we see every day the impact that financial education has on long-term outcomes. We have a huge youth population here and a significant and growing entrepreneurial class. If the future of the continent is in the hands of young people, we need them to be money smart. Providing access to financial education and an understanding of financial wellbeing gives the young people we work with a powerful head start. We’re thrilled to be working with Vivi and her team on this essential mission.”
