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# Sygnia's staff could be handed shares worth close to R600 million at today's price, for a cent each
- URL: https://www.businessbagel.com/sygnias-staff-could-be-handed-shares-worth-close-to-r600-million-at-todays-price-for-a-cent-each/
- Published: 2026-10-27T03:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-27T02:59:59.000Z
- Description: Shareholders approved a much bigger staff share scheme on Friday, and the founder likely to benefit owns enough of the company to make the pass mark easy to reach.
- Author: Christian Maidman
- Tags: Companies, Business Bagel News

A share scheme is how a company pays people partly in ownership rather than cash: staff get shares cheaply, and do well if the price rises. Sygnia, the investment manager whose founder and chief executive is Magda Wierzycka, has just made its scheme a great deal bigger.

At a general meeting on Friday, shareholders approved raising the most the scheme can hand out from 15 million shares to 25 million. About seven million have been awarded so far, so the bulk of that room is still unused.

Those shares go to participants at a cent each, and Moneyweb understands they vest over three to five years. With the share price at about R33, the unused room is worth close to R600 million, roughly an eighth of what the whole company is worth on the market. It is a ceiling on what could be awarded, not a cheque anyone has received.

## The founder's vote counted

The resolution needed three-quarters of the votes cast, and it cleared that with room to spare. Wierzycka was not excluded from voting, even though, in Moneyweb's words, she "in all likelihood will be a recipient of some of these shares in time to come". She owns 43% of Sygnia and her ex-husband Simon Peile holds 17%, so between them they own 60% of the company.

## How much the board gets to decide

Some minority shareholders criticised the scheme, and much of the criticism is about how much is left to the board. Under the approved terms, Moneyweb reports, the board has "complete discretion" to award any employee or executive up to five million shares without performance conditions, an award worth about R165 million at the current price. Above five million, the board sets the conditions and decides whether they were met. Moneyweb also points out that most JSE-listed companies let their boards set conditions and make awards in much the same way.

Wierzycka has defended the scheme in public. She told Biznews that if she fell "under the bus tomorrow", Sygnia had no share scheme that could attract or reward a new chief executive. She has also pointed out that she works on a 30-day notice period with no restraint of trade, and stressed to Biznews that this was not a threat to resign immediately.