Kenya Tops In Africa With Highest Number Of Billionaires, But They Are Not That Rich

Kenya has been ranked the fourth country in Africa with the highest number of billionaires, Africa Wealth report for 2019 showed that about 356 billionaires lived in Kenya in 2018.

According to the report by Mauritius based AfrAsia Bank, South Africa had the highest number of 2,169 billionaires followed by Egypt and Nigeria which had 932 and 531 respectively.

However, despite having huge number of billionaires, Kenya does not have a single person with assets of USD 1 bn (KES 100 bn) or a dollar billionaire.

South Africa has five dollar billionaires, Egypt has six dollar billionaires, Nigeria has four while Morocco has three.

Interestingly, Angola and Tanzania, both ranked lower than Kenya in the list of wealthiest African countries, but each has one dollar billionaire.

The report adds that there are 8,600 Kenyans with assets of over KES100 million (USD 1 million), another 340 valued at over KES1 billion (USD 10 million) and 16, whose net worth is estimated at over KES 10 billion (USD100 million).

Majority of Kenya’s richest people made their wealth from the manufacturing, real estate, and technology sectors.

Nairobi

Nairobi accounted for 73 percent of Kenya’s billionaires and it was named the sixth wealthiest city in Africa, forming almost 53 percent of Kenya’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), 

“We expect Nairobi to break into the top five wealthiest cities in Africa soon possibly replacing Lagos which has been slipping down on the list,” the report added.

Out of the 8600 million dollar wealthy people, 6200 are in Nairobi translating to 72 percent.

240 of 340 billionaires in Kenya reside in Nairobi while most of the 16-multi billionaires in the country make their money in the city.

Generally, there are 23 billionaires living in Africa, each with net assets of $1 billion or more, there are 2,140 billionaires in the world, each with net assets of $1 billion or more,”

“Despite accounting for 16 percent of the world’s population, Africa only accounts for one percent of the total worldwide… total wealth held on the continent amounts to $2.2 trillion (compared to total private wealth in the world estimated at $304 trillion).