Aliko Dangote drops out of list of top 80 billionaires as net worth slumps

Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote has now dropped out of the list of the top 80 richest billionaires, as his net worth plummeted below the $19-billion threshold for the first time since Sept. 29, 2021, according to data obtained from the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

With a net worth of $19.2 billion at the start of the year, Dangote ranked as the 97th wealthiest person in the world. On May 13, the Nigerian billionaire businessman and industrialist emerged as the world’s 61st richest man after his net worth surpassed $21 billion for the first time since 2014.

Since then, despite receiving a total dividend from his publicly traded businesses of $725.2 million this year, a significant increase over the $639.5 million that he received last year, his net worth has gone on a downward trend, wiping out prior gains and pushing him back on the world’s richest list.

The recent decline in his net worth, which has brought his wealth figures below $19 billion, can be attributed to the fall in the share price of his flagship company, Dangote Cement.

With the recent slump, Dangote, who derives the majority of his net worth from his 86.6-percent stake in Dangote Cement, joins a long list of African billionaires whose wealth has declined by more than $200 million since the beginning of this year.

As of press time on Sept. 13, Bloomberg estimates his year-to-date wealth loss to be more than $210 million, as his net worth has declined from $19.1 billion at the beginning of the year to $18.9 billion at the time of drafting this report.

Shares in Dangote Cement, Africa’s leading cement behemoth with a production capacity of 51.55 million tonnes per year across 10 countries, have fallen from N257 ($0.6) to N245 ($0.573) since the start of the year.

On the other hand, the market value of Dangote’s 86.6-percent stake in the company has fallen by $410 million since the beginning of 2022, from $8.79 billion to $8.38 billion.

The drop in the company’s stock can be attributed to investors’ reaction to its half-year earnings figures, which revealed a double-digit drop in profit in the first half of 2022 due to higher energy costs and unrealized foreign exchange losses.