Assignment 2
Semester 2
Due 19 September 2025
, SUPREME COURT OF APPEAL OF SOUTH AFRICA
MEDIA SUMMARY – JUDGMENT DELIVERED IN THE SUPREME COURT OF APPEAL
FROM The Registrar, Supreme Court of Appeal
DATE 18 March 2020
STATUS Immediate
Please note that the media summary is intended for the benefit of the media and does
not form part of the judgment of the Supreme Court of Appeal.
Global & Local Investments Advisors (Pty) Ltd v Nickolaus Ludick Fouché (71/2019)
[2019] ZASCA 08 (18 March 2020)
Today the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) dismissed an appeal with costs from Gauteng
Division of the High Court, Johannesburg (high court). The issue for determination on appeal
was whether the appellant, Global & Local Investments Advisors (Pty) Ltd (Global), a financial
services provider, breached a mandate in terms of which it was authorised to invest and
manage money entrusted to it by the respondent, Mr Nickolaus Ludick Fouché, by releasing
funds in response to fraudulent emails, ostensibly sent by the latter.
A brief background of the matter is that, on 23 November 2015 Mr Fouché, a mining
consultant, gave a written mandate to Global to act as his agent and invest money with
Investec Bank on his behalf. The written mandate stipulated that ‘All instructions must be sent
by fax to 011 486 2915 or by email to with client’s signature.’ The
money was to be invested in a Corporate Cash Manager (CCM) account in the name of Mr
Fouché. Global opened the CCM accounts for its clients at Investec and then managed the
accounts for a fee expressed as a percentage of the funds invested for the client in such
accounts. In August 2016 fraudsters hacked the gmail account of Mr Fouché and utilising his
authentic email credentials, sent three emails to Global on 15, 18 and 24 August 2016. In the
emails Global was instructed to transfer specified amounts to accounts of named third parties
at First National Bank (FNB). Two of the three emails containing the instructions to transfer
money, ended with the words: ‘Regards, Nick’ while the third ended with ‘Thanks, Nick’. In
response, Global paid out a total of R804 000 from Mr Fouché’s CCM account to unknown
third parties in three tranches as follows: R100 000 on 15 August 2016, R375 000 on 18