cover credits: all rights reserved; si.siva/corbis; v.Fournier/Ja; m.shoul For Ja; d.hutton/getty images; g.olamikan For tar; h. krog/getty images; ky chung photo; s.dawson/getty images; s.cherkaoui For J.a; l; bonaventure/aFp
editorial
The AfricA reporT | money supplemenT may 2016
by nic cholAs norbrook
CONTENTS
Th he long, hard slo og ahead
03 eDiToriAl The long, hard slog ahead 04 inTerView Akinwumi Adesina The AfDB president tells The Africa Report about the continental bank’s priorities, from agriculture to electricity and infrastructure
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elcome to a new editorial project from The Africa Report: Money. From the global migrations of bulge-bracket investors to the modest contributions of microfinance, the publication will follow finance as it strengthens Africa’s economies. Marvel, as long-tenor finance builds cities out of mortgages in Nigeria. Wonder, as East African bankers transform cyber dreams into realworld businesses. But understanding the provenance of money, as highlighted by the Panama Papers scandal, can be as critical as seeing what it is used for. Witness South African bankers drop the controversy-hit Gupta family’s accounts like they are hot. Witness Kenyan regulators squirm as the third bank in eight months – Chase Bank – is placed into receivership. This is not an idle, liberal utopia of greater transparency driving better behaviour. Better corporate governance is not just an end in itself – although the moral dimension is there and unarguable. Improved governance will also drive better results, allowing the financial system to do what it should do best, the alchemy of intermediation – taking long-term savings to fund today’s opportunities. As Karim Sadek, a managing director at Egyptian investment fund Qalaa Holdings, tells us, this is where African banks are failing. Having to raise more than $150m to refit a railway, Sadek soon discovered that he had to turn to foreign funders, where he was charged
08 who’s who Fifty influential African financiers Our run-down of a new generation of bankers and innovators who are staking their claims to Africa’s burgeoning financial markets 20 Top 100 Africa’s bigest banks and bosses The CEOs and MDs driving change in Africa’s financial institutions 22 VenTure cApiTAl Waiting for lift-off in Kenya’s ‘Silicon Savannah’ 26 inTerView James Mworia The CEO of Centum Investment on growth potential in Kenya’s health, education and agribusiness sectors
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11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 1 Abiola Bawuah 2 Arif Naqvi 3 Akinwumi Adesina 4 Ahmed Ghazali 5 Arunma Oteh 6 Charles Kié 7 Tshepidi Moremong
8 Clergy Simatyaba 9 Viola Llewellyn 10 Daniel Matjila 11 Chinelo AnohuAmazu 12 Hannington Namara 13 Hisham El Khazindar 14 Segun Agbaje 15 Patrick Njoroge 16 Hela Cheikhrouhou 17 Joshua Oigara 18 Sipho Moyo 19 Oscar Onyema 20 Vera Songwe 21 Pravin Gordhan 22 Zeinab Hashim
a 6% interest rate. “If I had gone to get this money from Kenya, I would have found a 15-year loan in local currency […] but it would have cost me anywhere from 14% to 16%.” African economies need their banks to step up now more than ever. The years ahead will be a tough slog. Though African oil exporters were not the only ones caught out by the fall in commodity prices – witness the recent credit downgrade of Saudi Arabia – many administrations face a serious fiscal crunch. With governments being such large spenders, this downturn will remove a large proportion of the cash circulating in these economies, to say nothing of local banks exposed to the sector. Already, the World Bank reduced its sub-Saharan growth forecast to 3.3%, largely driven by China’s withdrawal from commodity markets. In the last quarter of 2015, China grew at its slowest pace for 25 years. The International Monetary Fund warns of a couple of bumpy years ahead. In January Elmer Funke Kupper, then head of the stock exchange in Australia – a country exposed to China’s commodity appetites – sounded the alarm that the world’s $200trn debt burden risked hurting emerging markets. So it was refreshing to hear such positive thinking, fresh ideas and enthusiasm for African opportunity at the Africa CEO Forum in Abidjan on 21-22 March: Turn inward for growth, use domestic savings and learn to be agile. These are all lessons the delegates exhorted in private and public. We will track their successes and their near misses, right here, in Money. ●
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