FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS 0
Large banks and financial institutions invest tens to sometimes hundreds of thousands of rands into marketing their websites to explain why they should be the obvious choice. The reality is that most potential clients struggle to tell the difference. The messaging is polished, persuasive, and often very similar.
At CTI International, we believe there is a better question to ask.
Instead of focusing on the company, ask about the leader, the jockey, not just the horse. A business is ultimately a reflection of how its leader thinks, decides, and acts.
Here are five facts that set Mike Russon, Managing Director of CTI International, apart from the directors of large banks and financial institutions:
100% Founder and Shareholder
Mike Russon is the sole shareholder of all CTI companies. Every business was built from the ground up, brick by brick, without inheritance, mergers, or corporate handovers.
Fully Self-Financed
CTI does not rely on public funds, depositor money, or external investors. This independence allows the business to make decisions quickly and consistently in the best interests of its clients.
Direct Involvement with Clients
Unlike traditional banks, where clients deal with layers of management, Mike remains personally involved from initial engagement through onboarding and beyond. Clients are not handed over and forgotten.
Leadership by Listening – and Acting
Mike firmly believes that long-term success comes from listening to both staff and clients. He travels locally and internationally to engage directly with clients, often with his team on standby. He has a rare ability to assess ideas quickly, and when a suggestion has merit, he is known to implement changes immediately, sometimes during the meeting itself. This level of responsiveness is extremely rare in large institutions.
Purpose Over Personal Gain
Mike lives well below his financial means and works from passion, not ego. He has never chased money, he believes money is the by-product of doing meaningful work well. His motivation is making a real difference in people’s lives and sharing better ways of doing business, often without being asked.
Mike often says, “We are all ordinary people with extraordinary determination.”
Many more positive attributes could be listed, but these five capture the essence of why CTI International is different, and why so many clients choose us over traditional institutions.
Absolutely. CTI Financiers offers a fully integrated, turnkey finance solution that goes far beyond providing capital. We effectively manage the financial engine room of your business, allowing you to focus on growth, operations, and strategy.
Our services include, but are not limited to:
- Credit vetting of new customers and onboarding of existing clients
- Invoice generation and statement reconciliation
- Full collections and debtor management process
- Comprehensive risk assessment and ongoing monitoring
- Direct payment of suppliers, both locally and internationally
- End-to-end administration linked to the funded transaction
- Detailed management reporting and transparency at every stage
- Best of all, we do not charge for our time. Our interests are fully aligned with yours.
What this means for you
By partnering with CTI Financiers, you gain more than finance, you gain a highly experienced back-office operation without the overheads.
The benefits to your business include:
- Significant time savings, freeing management to focus on growth
- Reduced operating costs, no need to hire or expand internal finance staff
- Improved cash flow efficiency, faster collections and tighter controls
- Lower risk exposure, professional credit vetting and monitoring
- Operational simplicity, one partner managing the full financial workflow
- Clear reporting, full visibility and structured financial insights
- Scalability, systems that grow seamlessly as your business grows
In short, we don’t just fund your business, we help run it more efficiently, profitably, and safely.
Yes, we do, by design.
CT International deliberately limits the number of clients we finance. This ensures that every client receives the time, attention, and strategic involvement they deserve.
Our CEO is personally motivated by meaningful interaction with clients and is deeply passionate about adding tangible, personalised value beyond funding alone. This level of involvement simply isn’t possible when working with hundreds of clients.
If you are accepted as a client, you will never be treated as a number. You will be treated as a person, with respect, care, and direct access to decision-makers who are genuinely invested in your success.
If this approach resonates with you, CT International may be the right long-term partner for your business.
Yes we are. Our financial license number is: NCRCP1058
We are a member of the Credit Association of South Africa
We believe in fair and transparent pricing, with no hidden clauses or early-settlement penalties.
On corporate finance, we apply a reduced fee when invoices are settled ahead of time.
On consumer finance, interest is charged only on the outstanding balance. This means that if you settle early, you automatically save on the remaining interest costs.
Simply put, when your business performs well and settles early, you benefit. Our structures are designed to support your success, not penalise it.
Personal loans, companies under duress. Clients who have a poor history of Integrity and values. Start up companies.
Security, type of industry, how long you have been operating for, management accounts, historical growth.
These are the majority of factors which we consider.
Within 48 hours providing they furnish us with the relevant information required.
Our head office is in Cape Town. We operate both nationally and abroad.
I started when I was 22 years old.
Yes . Our team understood our clients needs. We put our key people in place to drive the engine room. We facilitated all their importing and clearing of goods, distribution to warehousing, invoicing, etc.
We believe the client must focus on their core strength such and marketing relationship building and the technical side of their product which they did and we focused on our strengths such as managing the engine room.
Additional fixed asset security is typically not required when an existing client requests an increase in their facility, and board decisions are usually made within 24 hours because we understand that time is profit.
Absolutely. Our discretion is one of our key strengths.
The most effective way to explain how this works in practice is through a real client example.
One of our clients previously operated under a R10 million facility with Investec. While the client had confirmed orders and strong growth potential, the size and structure of the institution meant there was limited flexibility to adapt to the client’s operational and funding requirements.
The client was subsequently introduced to our CEO, Mike Russon, who personally assessed, onboarded, and structured a solution tailored to the business’s immediate needs. This included not only funding, but a full turnkey operational framework.
Within 90 days, the client’s monthly invoicing increased to approximately R45 million.
Within 12 months, monthly invoicing had grown to approximately R120 million.
This growth was achieved through rapid decision-making, swift deployment of capital, and hands-on management of the financial and operational engine room of the business.
Shortly thereafter, the client was approached by an investment firm and successfully exited the business in a transaction exceeding one billion in cash payout.