10 things to know about the budget

Government is getting to grips with social media influencers, ghosts in the machine, online gambling and crypto. Here’s more that you should know from Wednesday’s budget.

Under the influencers

The South African Revenue Service (Sars) boasted about registering 1.3-million new taxpayers across various categories, adding R4.9bn to revenue. Most notably, it started making a play for the attention industry. “The tax authority also engaged with digital economy participants, particularly social influencers, to facilitate tax compliance in this emerging segment,” Treasury noted. Some 26-million people in this country are active on social media, and Sars is now working on pinning down an exact definition for influencers, said commissioner Edward Kieswetter. In the meantime, those who earn an income by influencing fall into the regular tax net and if earning above the current thresholds they “should be declaring it”, he added.

Ghosting

Government is continuing with its “ghost worker” audit to root out non-existent or ineligible individuals on the public sector payroll. The ghost worker audit has identified some 4,323 suspicious cases in the personnel management system, Persal. A verification process, which includes checking the National Population Register and physical verification, is under way “and employees who cannot be physically verified will have salaries withheld and their employment status suspended”.

Long Covid

The social relief of distress grant, first instituted as an emergency measure during the Covid pandemic, will be allocated an additional R36.4bn this year to extend payments until March 31 2027. Beneficiaries receive R370 per month. The discussion on this grant is an “ongoing exercise” and will probably be outlined later this year in the medium-term budget policy statement, finance minister Enoch Godongwana said in a media briefing before speaking in parliament.

Taking a gamble

National Treasury’s plans to slap online gambling with a 20% tax on gross revenue is open for comment until the end of the week. Then it will hold a workshop with those who commented and spin the wheel with draft legislation later this year.

Looking better in uniform

An additional amount of R2.7bn will be allocated to defence over the medium term. This is to improve operations, and includes maintaining the South African Air Force’s fighter capability. But also, procuring uniforms.

Unclaimed assets

Plans are afoot to centralise the management and investment of more than R88bn in unclaimed financial assets. This includes retirement benefits, bank accounts, investments and insurance payouts. The purpose is to let the benefits accrue to the actual owners of these assets instead of allowing financial institutions or the government to rake in the proceeds or just sit on those amounts.

Catching up on crypto

Treasury is planning amendments to exchange-control regulations to include crypto assets in its capital flows management framework. This is to complement regulation by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority, which four years ago officially declared crypto assets (such as bitcoin and ethereum) to be “financial products”. Similar regulatory action has been taken by the Financial Intelligence Centre, when it in 2025 designated crypto asset service providers as accountable institutions subject to supervision, which includes reporting, registration and enforcement.

Cash and carry

No longer will you only be allowed to carry R25,000 in South African bank notes when entering or exiting the country. To maintain purchasing power for travellers, Treasury said, the limit will now be increased to R100,000.

Grants

Checks by the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) flagged some 291,581 grant beneficiaries for review. Sassa had to do this as part of getting its own grant from Treasury for the last fiscal year. And so the agency used improved biometric and income verification processes, and is undertaking more frequent eligibility reviews. By December 2025, the agency had checked the bank accounts of about 6-million clients and 8-million credit bureau clients. As a result, income grant amounts were adjusted for 8,599 disability and old‐age grant recipients in accordance with the eligibility criteria. This results in projected savings of R36.4m in 2025/26. A further 34,661 grants were cancelled, generating expected savings of R170.7m by the end of 2025/26.

Into the sunset

To rejuvenate the civil service and, more importantly, manage the wage bill, an early retirement programme has been embarked on. Some 7,687 applications from eligible employees were approved, of which 4,644 were in the provinces and the rest in national departments. The total cost amounts to R3.7bn but the estimated net savings are R5.5bn, about half of which will be realised in fiscal year 2026/27.

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