Lagos tops Nigeria’s investment destination with $8.304bn capital inflow

Lagos State, Nigeria’s commercial city, has emerged top destination of capital investment in Nigeria, recording $829.64 million inflow in fourth-quarter (Q4) 2020 and $8.304 billion in full-year 2020, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) latest report on Nigerian Capital Importation (Q4/full-year 2020) shows.

Lagos, which accounted for 77.56 percent of the total capital inflow in Q4 2020, will next week hold its economic summit – Ehingbeti 2021 – aimed at bringing forth good policy environment that will further attract investment to the state.

The total value of capital importation into Nigeria stood at $1.069 billion in Q4 2020. This represents a decrease of 26.81 percent compared with Q3 2020 and 71.87 percent decrease compared to Q4 2019.

Capital is either imported in the form of Shares, or directly imported by different sectors of the economy. Share capital investment is closely related to Equity investment – Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Portfolio investment.

Lagos recorded $829.64 million imported capital in Q4, followed by Abuja (FCT), which saw $222.64 million, and Anambra ($8.86m.

Also, capital imported into Adamawa was $20,000 in Q4, 2020, Akwa Ibom ($810,000), Kaduna ($1.99m), Kano ($1.30m), Niger ($4.03m), and Ogun ($400,000).

In the Q4 period, states that did not record any form of imported capital, according to NBS data, are: Abia, Bauchi, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Jigawa, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Plateau, Rivers, Sokoto, Taraba, Yobe, and Zamfara.

Nigeria’s total value of capital imported in 2020 stood at $9.680 billion, compared with $23.990 billion in 2019, representing a decline of 59.65 percent between the two periods.

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Details of other states’ imported capital in 2020 show that Abia attracted $56.07 million, Abuja $1.270 billion, Adamawa $20,000, Akwa Ibom $1.05 million, Anambra $10.02 million, Kaduna $4.03 million, Kano $2.38 million, Niger $16.36 million, Ogun $13.39 million, and Sokoto $2.50 million.

The following states did not record any form of capital import in 2020 – Bauchi, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Benue, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Jigawa, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Plateau, Rivers, Taraba, Yobe, and Zamfara.

The UK emerged as the top source of capital investment in Nigeria in Q4 2020, with $236.88 million. This accounted for 22.14 percent of the total capital inflow in Q4 2020.

By bank, Citibank Nigeria Limited emerged top of capital investment in Nigeria in Q4 2020, with $216.17 million. This accounted for 20.21 percent of the total capital inflow in Q4 2020.

By sector, capital importation by Shares dominated in Q4 2020, reaching $287.04 million of the total capital importation in Q4 2020.

The largest amount of capital importation by type was received through other investment, which accounted for 73.22 percent ($783.26m) of total capital importation, followed by FDI, which accounted for 23.49 percent ($251.27m) of total capital imported.

This comprises equity ($248.73m) and Other Capital ($2.54m). Also, Portfolio Investment accounted for 3.29 percent ($35.15m) of total capital imported in Q4 2020 – this comprises equity ($18.05m) and money market instruments ($17.10m).