Capital Flows to Africa: China versus United States

The Africa Report, which is published by the Jeune Afrique Media Group, ran on 25 July 2019 an analysis titled "The US Must Pay Attention to New Chinese Capital Flows to Africa" by Aubrey Hruby.

The author argues that the strategic threat to future US competitiveness in African markets are not Chinese government-to-government loans to finance infrastructure, but rather the growing Chinese footprint in areas of traditional US investment strengths, such as foreign direct investment, private equity, and venture capital.

2016 African Private Equity Data Tracker

The African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association published in February 2017 its "2016 Annual Private Equity Data Tracker."

It recorded 919 private equity deals in Africa from 2011 through 2016 with a value of $22.7 billion. East Africa and the Horn received a respectable 18 percent of these deals but they accounted for only 8 percent of the dollar value of the deals. By dollar value, multi-region deals led with 36 percent, West Africa with 27 percent, southern Africa with 15 percent, North Africa with 13 percent, and Central Africa with 1 percent.

Private Investors Pile into Africa

CNBC published on 17 March 2015 a nice summary titled "Private Investors Pile into Africa" by Lawrence Delevingne.  Drawing on data produced by the London-based African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (AVCA), the author notes that private equity firms invested $8.1 billion in African companies in 2014.  US equity firms are the largest investors.  Nigeria is the largest recipient at 25 percent of the African total followed by South Africa with 24 percent.  Much of the investment is going into telecommunications.  AVCA tracks the investment at its "African Private Equity Data Tracker."