14. COMMON STOCK

Common stock

Holders of shares of Net1's common stock are entitled to receive dividends and other distributions when declared by Net1's board of directors out of legally available funds. Payment of dividends and distributions is subject to certain restrictions under the Florida Business Corporation Act, including the requirement that after making any distribution Net1 must be able to meet its debts as they become due in the usual course of its business.

Upon voluntary or involuntary liquidation, dissolution or winding up of Net1, holders of common stock share ratably in the assets remaining after payments to creditors and provision for the preference of any preferred stock according to its terms. There are no pre-emptive or other subscription rights, conversion rights or redemption or scheduled installment payment provisions relating to shares of common stock. All of the outstanding shares of common stock are fully paid and non-assessable.

Each holder of common stock is entitled to one vote per share for the election of directors and for all other matters to be voted on by shareholders. Holders of common stock may not cumulate their votes in the election of directors, and are entitled to share equally and ratably in the dividends that may be declared by the board of directors, but only after payment of dividends required to be paid on outstanding shares of preferred stock according to its terms. The shares of Net1 common stock are not subject to redemption.

The Company's number of shares, net of treasury, presented in the consolidated balance sheets and consolidated statement of changes in equity includes participating non-vested equity shares (specifically contingently returnable shares) as described below in Note 18"—Amended and Restated Stock Incentive Plan—Restricted Stock—General Terms of Awards". The following table presents reconciliation between the number of shares, net of treasury, presented in the consolidated statement of changes in equity and the number of shares, net of treasury, excluding non-vested equity shares that have not vested during the years ended June 30, 2016, 2015 and 2014:

	2016	2015	2014

Number of shares, net of treasury:
Statement of changes in equity – common stock	55,271,954	46,679,565	47,819,299
Less: Non-vested equity shares that have not vested as of end of
year (Note 18)	589,447	341,529	385,778
Number of shares, net of treasury excluding non-vested
equity shares that have not vested	54,682,507	46,338,036	47,433,521

Redeemable common stock issued pursuant to transaction with the IFC Investors

Holders of redeemable common stock have all the rights of enjoyed by holders of common stock, however, holders of redeemable common stock have additional contractual rights. On April 11, 2016, the Company entered into a Subscription Agreement (the "Subscription Agreement") with International Finance Corporation, IFC African, Latin American and Caribbean Fund, LP, IFC Financial Institutions Growth Fund, LP, and Africa Capitalization Fund, Ltd. (collectively, the "IFC Investors"). Under the Subscription Agreement, the IFC Investors purchased, and the Company sold in the aggregate, approximately 9.98 million shares of the Company's common stock, par value $0.001 per share, at a price of $10.79 per share, for gross proceeds to the Company of approximately $107.7 million. The Company has accounted for these 9.98 million shares as redeemable common stock as a result of the put option discussed below.

The Company has entered into a Policy Agreement with the IFC Investors (the "Policy Agreement"). The material terms of the Policy Agreement are described below.

Board Rights

For so long as the IFC Investors in aggregate beneficially own shares representing at least 5% of the Company's common stock, the IFC Investors will have the right to nominate one director to the Company's board of directors. For so long as the IFC Investors in aggregate beneficially own shares representing at least 2.5% of the Company's common stock, the IFC Investors will have the right to appoint an observer to the Company's board of directors at any time when they have not designated, or do not have the right to designate, a director.

Registration Rights

The Company has agreed to grant certain registration rights to the IFC Investors for the resale of their shares of the Company's common stock, including filing a resale shelf registration statement and taking certain actions to facilitate resales thereunder.

Put Option

Each Investor will have the right, upon the occurrence of specified triggering events, to require the Company to repurchase all of the shares of its common stock purchased by the IFC Investors pursuant to the Subscription Agreement (or upon exercise of their preemptive rights discussed below). Events triggering this put right relate to (1) the Company being the subject of a governmental complaint alleging, a court judgment finding or an indictment alleging that the Company (a) engaged in specified corrupt, fraudulent, coercive, collusive or obstructive practices; (b) entered into transactions with targets of economic sanctions; or (c) failed to operate its business in compliance with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism laws; or (2) the Company rejecting a bona fide offer to acquire all of its outstanding Common Stock at a time when it has in place or implements a shareholder rights plan, or adopting a shareholder rights plan triggered by a beneficial ownership threshold of less than twenty percent. The put price per share will be the higher of the price per share paid by the IFC Investors pursuant to the Subscription Agreement (or paid when exercising their preemptive rights) and the volume weighted average price per share prevailing for the 60 trading days preceding the triggering event, except that with respect a put right triggered by rejection of a bona fide offer, the put price per share will be the highest price offered by the offeror. The Company believes that the put option has no value and, accordingly, has not recognized the put option in its consolidated financial statements.

Preemptive Rights

For so long as the IFC Investors hold in aggregate 5% of the outstanding shares of common stock of the Company, each Investor will have the right to purchase its pro-rata share of new issuances of securities by the Company, subject to certain exceptions.

Common stock repurchases

Executed under share repurchase authorizations

During November and December 2015, the Company repurchased an aggregate of 749,213 shares of its common stock for approximately $11.2 million under its share repurchase authorization that was approved on August 21, 2013. On February 3, 2016, the Company's Board of Directors approved the replenishment of its share repurchase authorization to repurchase up to an aggregate of $100 million of common stock. The authorization has no expiration date. During February and June 2016, the Company repurchased an aggregate of 1,677,491 shares for approximately $15.9 million under its replenished share repurchase authorization which resulted in a total of 2,426,704 shares repurchased for approximately $27.1 million under its various share repurchase authorizations.

The share repurchase authorization will be used at management's discretion, subject to limitations imposed by SEC Rule 10b-18 and other legal requirements and subject to price and other internal limitations established by the Board. Repurchases will be funded from the Company's available cash. Share repurchases may be made through open market purchases, privately negotiated transactions, or both. There can be no assurance that the Company will purchase any shares or any particular number of shares. The authorization may be suspended, terminated or modified at any time for any reason, including market conditions, the cost of repurchasing shares, liquidity and other factors that management deems appropriate. The Company did not repurchase any of its shares during the years ended June 30, 2015 and 2014, under this authorization.

On June 29, 2016, the Company adopted a Rule 10b5-1 plan for the purpose of repurchasing approximately $50 million of its common stock. The 10b5-1 Plan was established in connection with the $100 million share repurchase program approved on February 3, 2016. A plan under Rule 10b5-1 allows a company to repurchase its shares at times when it otherwise might be prevented from doing so under insider trading laws or because of self-imposed trading blackout periods. A broker selected by the Company has the authority under the terms and limitations specified in the 10b5-1 Plan to repurchase shares on the Company's behalf in accordance with the terms thereof.

Other repurchases

During the year ended June 30, 2015, the Company entered into a Subscription and Sale of Shares Agreement with Business Venture Investments No 1567 Proprietary Limited (RF) ("BVI"), one of the Company's BEE partners, in preparation for any new potential SASSA tender. Pursuant to the agreement: (i) the Company repurchased BVI's remaining 1,837,432 shares of the Company's common stock for approximately ZAR 97.4 million in cash ($9.2 million translated at exchange rates prevailing as of August 27, 2014) and (ii) BVI subscribed for new ordinary shares of Cash Paymaster Services (Pty) Ltd ("CPS") representing approximately 12.5% of CPS' ordinary shares outstanding after the subscription for ZAR 15.0 million in cash (approximately $1.4 million translated at exchange rates prevailing as of August 27, 2014). In connection with transactions described above, the CPS shareholder agreement that was negotiated as part of the original December 2013 Relationship Agreement became effective. In addition, during the year ended June 30, 2014, the Company repurchased 2,428,122 shares for approximately $24.9 million as described below under "—December 2013 Black Economic Empowerment transactions—Salient terms of the BEE Relationship Agreements".

December 2013 Black Economic Empowerment transactions

On December 10, 2013, the Company entered into definitive agreements relating to two Black Economic Empowerment ("BEE") transactions. On April 16, 2014, the Company implemented these transactions and issued 4,400,000 shares of its common stock to its BEE partners after all the agreed conditions had been satisfied. On June 6, 2014, the Company repurchased approximately 2.4 million of these shares of common stock and the BEE partners used the proceeds from the repurchase to settle their obligations due to the South African subsidiary of the Company, as described below. Furthermore, as discussed above under "—Common stock repurchases—Other repurchases", the Company acquired BVI's remaining 1,837,432 shares of Company common stock pursuant to a transaction concluded during the year ended June 30, 2015.

Salient terms of the BEE Relationship Agreements

Pursuant to Relationship Agreements between the Company and its BEE partners, the Company sold an aggregate of 4,400,000 shares of its common stock ("BEE shares"), which are contractually restricted as to resale as described below, for a purchase price of ZAR 60.00 per share. This price represented 75% of the closing price of the Company's common stock on the JSE on December 6, 2013, the date the Company completed final negotiation of the terms of these BEE transactions. In South Africa, it is customary for BEE equity investment transactions in companies, including publicly-traded companies, to be priced at a substantial discount to the fair value or current trading price of the subject company's shares. The 25% discount was negotiated between the parties on an arm's length basis and took into account a number of factors reflecting the lack of liquidity of the BEE shares due to the contractual provisions described below.

The Relationship Agreements provided for the entire purchase price for the BEE shares to be financed through a five-year loan to be extended to each of the BEE partners by a South African subsidiary of the Company. The obligations of the BEE partners under the loans were several, and not joint. Each of the BEE partners granted the lender a security interest in all the BEE shares purchased by such BEE partner to secure the repayment of its loan. The principal amount of the loans made by the subsidiary was contributed by Net1 to the equity capital of the subsidiary. As a result of the making of the loans, the net cash position of the Company after the sale of the BEE shares remained unchanged.

The loans bore interest at a rate equal to the Johannesburg Interbank Rate plus 300 basis points. Interest on the loans was payable semi-annually in arrears on January 1 and July 1 of each year. 10% of the outstanding principal amount of the loans was payable on each of the first and second anniversaries of the date of issuance of the BEE shares, 15% of the outstanding principal amount of the loans was payable on each of the third and fourth anniversaries of the date of issuance of the BEE shares and the remaining outstanding principal amount of the loans was payable on the fifth anniversary of the date of issuance of the BEE shares. Further, the entire outstanding principal amount of the loans was payable if the price of the Company's common stock on the JSE equals or exceeds ZAR 120.00 per share at any time during term of the loans. The loans to the BEE partners did not provide that they were recourse only to the BEE shares. Nevertheless, the Company expected that the sole source of repayment of the loans will be proceeds from the sale of its shares by the BEE partners from time to time, in open market or in privately negotiated transactions.

Upon the occurrence of certain "trigger events" with respect to a BEE partner, the BEE shares held by that BEE partner may be repurchased by the Company or one of its designees. These trigger events include the following:

failure by the BEE partner to pay any amount due on its loan (including interest) to the lender (in this case, the Company may repurchase only that number of shares which would raise sufficient funds to settle any amount due and unpaid);
any other breach by the BEE partner (or in certain circumstances its shareholders) of any provision of the Relationship Agreement, including without limitation, its failure to maintain its BEE status;
the Company's common stock trades at or below ZAR 60.00 on the JSE or at or below the equivalent trading price on Nasdaq;
the occurrence of certain insolvency events or liquidation proceedings affecting the BEE partner; or
the BEE partner fails to satisfy any judgment or arbitration award granted or made against it within 7 days.

If the trigger event involved a failure by a BEE partner to pay any amount due on its loan, then the repurchase price is the volume-weighted average price of the Company's common stock on the Nasdaq for the period of 30 trading days prior to the trigger event ("30-day VWAP"). In the case of other trigger events, the repurchase price is the lower of the 30-day VWAP or ZAR 60.00 per share.

The Company's share price exceeded ZAR 120.00 on June 4, 2014 and all outstanding amounts then became due and payable. The BEE partners were unable to pay all outstanding amounts due on June 5, 2014, and accordingly a trigger event occurred. The Company purchased a total of 2,428,122 shares of its common stock, at the determined VWAP of ZAR109.98, from the BEE partners. The BEE partners used the proceeds from the sale of these shares in order to settle all outstanding amounts due to the South African subsidiary of the Company.

The BEE shares are contractually restricted as to resale for a period of five years from the date of issuance, with the exception of periodic sales which would have been made to fund the repayment of principal and interest on the loans if they had not been repaid in full in June 2014. In addition, the Company may call the BEE shares then owned by the BEE partners, either in exchange for a minority interest in CPS or for a cash payment equal to the 30-day VWAP. Further, after the fifth anniversary of the date of issuance of the BEE shares, the Company will have a right of first refusal on the shares owned by the BEE partners.

Acquisition of non-controlling interests

During the year ended June 30, 2016, the Company acquired all of the issued share capital of Masterpayment and Smart Life that it did not previously own for approximately $11.2 million and $0.001 million, respectively, in cash. During the year ended June 30, 2014, the Company acquired all of the issued share capital of KSNET, Inc. that it did not previously own for approximately $2.0 million in cash. These transactions were accounted for as an equity transaction with a non-controlling interest and accordingly, no gain or loss was recognized in the Company's consolidated statement of operations. The carrying amount of the respective non-controlling interest was adjusted to reflect the change in ownership interest in each of Masterpayment, Smiart Life and KSNET. During the years ended June 30, 2016 and 2014, the difference between the fair value of the consideration paid and the amount by which the non-controlling interest was adjusted, of $1.3 million and 1.5 million, respectively, was recognized in total Net1 equity.