93% probability Standard Bank Group's calendar 2026 headline earnings reach at least R48bn, after a record R26.1bn in the first half with ROE of 19.8%. Headline earnings is a specifically South African defined measure, and the criterion says so.
Standard Bank Group reported record headline earnings of R26.1bn for the six months ended 30 June 2026, up 10% period-on-period, with headline earnings per share and dividends per share both rising 10% and return on equity improving to 19.8% — comfortably within the group's 2028 ROE target range of 18% to 22%. Guidance for the 12 months to 31 December 2026 remains unchanged: banking revenue growth of mid-to-high single digits, a cost-to-income ratio expected to decline slightly, a credit loss ratio slightly higher than 2025 but within the lower half of the through-the-cycle target range of 70 to 100 basis points, and ROE higher than in the prior year. The group reiterated medium-term targets through 2028 of banking revenue growth of 7% to 10% a year on average and headline earnings per share growth of 8% to 12% a year on average. Source: Standard Bank Group H1 2026 results.
We lock a binary: Standard Bank Group's reported headline earnings for calendar 2026 are R48bn or higher. Confidence 93% — joint highest in this tranche.
The first half delivered R26.1bn, which annualises to about R52bn. Our threshold sits roughly 7.7% below that. As with Vale at P-322, half the year is already banked, which is what permits a buffer this tight.
Headline earnings is not a loose descriptive term and it is not the same thing as IFRS attributable profit. It is a specifically South African measure, defined under a SAICA circular and required of JSE-listed companies, which strips out separately identifiable remeasurements — capital items such as gains and losses on the disposal of property, impairments of goodwill and similar — to leave what is intended to represent operating performance.
That matters for a lock. A criterion written as Standard Bank 2026 profit above R48bn would be genuinely ambiguous, because the group will report headline earnings, attributable profit and profit for the year, and those are three different numbers. The criterion below names HEADLINE EARNINGS, on the same basis as the R26.1bn interim figure, and rules the others out.
This series has hit the same class of problem in five other reporting regimes: underlying versus reported EBITDA at SkyCity (P-323), normalised versus statutory at Skellerup (P-324), standalone versus consolidated across three Indian tranches, adjusted versus statutory at Vector (P-316), and EBIT before significant items with and without property sales at Fletcher (P-306). Every jurisdiction has its own non-IFRS convention, and every one of them will resolve a lock two ways if the criterion does not name which.
Standard Bank published both kinds of forward statement in one set of results, which makes it the cleanest illustration in this tranche of the test set out at P-331.
For the 12 months to 31 December 2026 — a named period — it gave guidance: banking revenue growth in the mid-to-high single digits, a cost-to-income ratio declining slightly, a credit loss ratio slightly higher than 2025 but in the lower half of the 70-100 basis point through-the-cycle range, and ROE higher than the prior year. That is anchorable.
Separately it reiterated medium-term targets THROUGH 2028: banking revenue growth of 7-10% a year on average, and headline earnings per share growth of 8-12% a year on average. Those are averages over an unspecified path to a distant endpoint, and a single year landing outside them proves nothing. Not anchorable, and this lock does not use them.
The 2026 guidance points consistently upward — revenue growing, costs improving, ROE higher — and the first half delivered a record with ROE at 19.8%, already comfortably inside the 18-22% target band. For the lock to fail, second-half headline earnings would have to come in below about R21.9bn against a first half of R26.1bn: a decline of roughly 16% in a business the company is guiding to improve.
The residual 7% is a South African credit cycle turn pushing the credit loss ratio through the top of its range, or a sharp rand move affecting the translation of the group's substantial Africa Regions earnings.
RAOSCAFF locks P-338 on 2026-09-03, with the first half of calendar 2026 already reported. Scored against headline earnings as reported by Standard Bank Group for the year ended 31 December 2026.
Headline earnings, attributable profit and profit for the year are three different numbers in a South African annual report. A lock that says 'profit' picks its answer after the fact.