Africa has prospect for growth and should attract investment – Citibank CEO

Akin Dawodu, Citibank’s CEO for Sub-Saharan Africa said Africa has prospects for growth and investors can be a beneficiary of its growth.

He said at Prosper Africa’s U.S Africa Business Forum, 2022 that the reality of doing business on the African continent is very different, the growth in the economy is there and the outlook is not without challenges but the outlook for growth remains strong.

While speaking further on Africa’s growth outlook and the need for continuous investment on the continent he said “Africa still has the greatest headroom for economic growth of any continent on the planet and the smart bet is that headroom will be filled over time over the course of next few years and decades”.

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He noted that those who invest and are active in the continent now will be the main beneficiaries of that growth and expansion.

“We are advocates for this and our presence on the continent over a continued period of time is proof,” Dawodu said.

“COVID led to a market shutdown during its first year, by the next year 2021 there was a bounce back and that became a record year for Sub-Saharan African sovereigns in particular raising debt in the international capital markets.”

He stated that what we are experiencing now is also because of the inflationary effects partly because of the Russia-Ukraine war and partly because of the buildup of liquidity over time because of the quantitative easing policy of the FED and other central banks.

Citibank’s CEO for Sub-Saharan Africa also said that there is a quantitative tightening going on in the markets, rates are going up and access to the markets has become a little more complicated for Sub-Saharan entities of recent.