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Nigeria challenges the domination of South Africa.

Article Excerpt
THE TOTAL CONSOLIDATED assets in the African Business Top 100 listing for the first time ever exceeded one trillion dollars ($1,048bn), up 22.5% on 2008, while aggregate Tier-I capital (i.e. shareholders' equity) rose 37% to $83bn.

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North Africa with 40 banks (12 from Egypt) provides the largest grouping of banks. In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), West Africa, led by Nigeria, again provides the largest grouping of banks [26] against Southern Africa [20] and East Africa [12]. The industry, however, is heavily concentrated; 30 major banks hold 77%, of the region's financial assets and core capital (see Top 100 table).

That leaves $237.89bn to be shared among 70 banks, of which the five largest are Skye Bank, Societe Generale (Egypt), Stanbic IBTC, Banque Nationale d'Algerie and Mauritius Commercial Bank (MCB).

Nigeria continues to challenge the domination of South Africa in our league table, with three lenders led by Zenith Bank and First-Bank of Nigeria (First Bank) ranked among the top 10 African banks.

Nigerian banks' total capital base has swelled by threefold to $21.7bn in the 2009 rankings, from $7.2bn in 2007. That took Nigeria's share of Africa's banking capitalisation to 26.1%, up from 17.6% in 2007.

South Africa's share of total Tier-I capital fell from 53.4% in 2007 rankings to 33.0%. Real challenges for emerging banks are optimal utilisations of enlarged capital bases and achieving sustainable higher returns on total assets. Zenith Bank...

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