Friday, 29th March 2024
To guardian.ng
Search

Dangote, Adenuga top 2019 Forbes’ list of ‘poorer’ African billionaires

By Emeka Nwachukwu
11 January 2019   |   4:13 am
For eight years running, Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, maintained his position on Forbes’ new list of African billionaires, but lost nearly $2 billion compared to his net worth last year.

Alhaji Aliko Dangote

For eight years running, Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, maintained his position on Forbes’ new list of African billionaires, but lost nearly $2 billion compared to his net worth last year.

Tagged: Fewer Billionaires, Poorer Billionaires On African Continent In 2019, Forbes said the number of African billionaires fell to 20, down from 23 last year, having been buffeted by plunging stock prices and weaker currencies.

Overall, the 20 African business tycoons are worth $68.7 billion, down from $75.4 billion last year. However, the average net worth of each member on the list this year grew to $3.4 billion from $3.3 billion in early 2018.

The report revealed that Dangote’s estimated $10.3 billion net worth is nearly $2 billion less than a year ago, due to nearly 20 per cent drop in the stock price of Dangote Cement.

In 2015, Dangote’s net worth stood at $25 billion, but reduced by about $15 billion three years after.

Nigeria’s telecommunications guru, Mike Adenuga, emerged the continent’s second richest man with an estimated net worth of $9.2 billion.

Adenuga controls Globacom, Nigeria’s second-largest mobile telephone network, Conoil, extensive real estate holdings and a network of 12,000 cellphone towers.

His total net worth grew from $5.3 billion in January 2018 to $9.2 billion according to information he provided on his assets.

Africa’s richest woman, Folorunsho Alakija, whose net worth dropped last year, ranked number 19 on the list.

The Forbes report indicate that Alakija, who has a stake in one of the most productive oil fields operated by Chevron Nigeria Limited (CNL) dropped due to decline in the value of the oil field.

Nigeria’s cement mogul, Abdulsamad Rabiu, who runs the BUA Group, returned to number 16 on the list for the first time since 2015.

He made Kalambaina Cement firm a publicly traded Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN) in 2018.

Rabiu now owns 97 per cent of the company. Kalambaina, which operates a new cement production facility, started selling cement in mid-2018. But his OBU Cement, which operates independently, recently expanded its operations, with a new production line.

Forbes disclosed that the net worth was calculated using stock prices and exchange rates at the close of business on Friday, January 4, 2019.

Private businesses were, however, evaluated by coupling estimates of revenues or profits with prevailing price-to-sales or price-to-earnings ratios for similar public companies.

0 Comments