Mauritians are the wealthiest individuals in Africa with an average wealth of US$25,700 per person, whilst people living in Zimbabwe are the poorest with US$200 per person. Interestingly, North African countries such as Algeria, Egypt and Morocco all rank high on the list despite recent instability, see table. This was revealed in AfrAsia Bank and New World Wealth ‘AfrAsia Bank Africa Wealth Report 2017‘.
Note: “wealth per capita” refers to the average wealth of a person living in each country. It excludes government held wealth.
It should be noted that all these figures are below the global average of US$27,000. Top ranked worldwide countries such as Switzerland and Australia have wealth per capita’s of over US$200,000.
Other key findings from the report at the end of 2016 include:
- The average African individual had net assets of approximately US$2,000 (wealth per capita).
- Total individual wealth held on the continent amounted to US$2.2 trillion.
- There were approximately 145,000 HNWIs living in Africa, with combined wealth holdings of approximately US$800 billion.
- There were 7,010 multi-millionaires living in Africa.
Growth rate trends:
- African HNWI numbers have increased by 19% during the review period (2006-2016).
- 2016 was a bad year for African HNWIs. Their numbers decreased by 2% during the year.
- HNWI numbers in Africa are expected to rise by 36% over next 10 years, reaching approximately 198,000 by 2026.
