Francly 2021

I’m sure people all over the world are happy to see the end of 2021. The rollercoaster of Covid has continued to impact all of us. Whether that’s from working from home, the loss of a friend or family member or having to live under lockdown. And now it seems like a new variant is going to sweep over the world. I’m coming to the painful conclusion that Covid is something we are going to live with, just like the flu. Hopefully the prevention and treatment of Covid will continue to improve. Unfortunately, we’re not there yet and governments are still struggling to adapt to the new normal.

All of that uncertainty is hard to live with, not being sure if your income or livelihood will have to change can put a lot of pressure on a household and be a source of financial stress.

In times of uncertainty, I always try to go back to basics. For me that means, eat well, run a lot and get enough sleep. It also means cutting back on luxury spending and saving as much as I can on a monthly basis and investing for the future when I hope things will be easier.

As a team, we now are used to the new normal of working from home and using Google workspace to manage our work and connect with the team. It’s incredible how remote working tools have advanced in such a short time.

We’ve also seen how hard this year has been for our users. Many users have had to tap into their savings. On one level, I’m happy that we’ve been able to help so many people set up an emergency fund that they can access in time of need. However, it also makes me sad that times are indeed so rough for so many people.

We’ve hit some big milestones and had some major achievements this year. We launched the Franc Academy that offers anyone who is looking to expand their understanding of all things financial and investment knowledge. We pride ourselves on breaking down the complexity that so often blocks people from truly understanding what is happening to their money and why.

We’re going into the new year, looking forward to some major partnerships where we will help even more South Africans to save and invest more. So look out for some big announcements early next year. We’re also cooking up some new features in the app that is going to make investing fun.

So here’s to 2022 and all that it holds. From the Franc team, I wish you all a happy holiday!