Aliko Dangote is taking his $40 billion refinery public across Africa and wants every African to own a share

Aliko Dangote has spent more than a decade building the largest refinery in Africa. Now he wants every African to have the chance to own a piece of it.

Africa's richest man has appointed three financial advisers to lead a pan-African initial public offering of Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals FZE, with shares set to be listed across multiple African stock exchanges in what would be the largest equity offering in the continent's history. Stanbic IBTC Capital, Vetiva Advisory Services and FirstCap have been engaged to manage the process, with the listing targeting a formal debut on the Nigerian Exchange between June and July 2026.

Dangote first signaled the timeline publicly on Feb. 21, telling Nigerians they would be able to purchase shares within four to five months. The transaction is now moving through its stages. A prospectus submission to the Securities and Exchange Commission is expected in April, followed by a national retail roadshow and the launch of an electronic IPO subscription platform in May.

Analysts put the refinery's expected opening valuation at between $40 billion and $50 billion. The Dangote Group plans to float between 5% and 10% of the business, retaining majority control. At the top end of that range, the listing would push the Nigerian Exchange's total market capitalization through the 200 trillion naira threshold for the first time in the exchange's history.

The IPO is directly tied to a broader growth ambition Dangote has branded Vision 2030, a plan to invest $40 billion between now and 2030 and grow the Dangote Group into a $100 billion revenue enterprise. Capital raised through the listing will go toward doubling refinery capacity from 650,000 barrels per day to 1.4 million barrels per day, quadrupling fertilizer production, establishing potash and phosphate plants in the Democratic Republic of Congo and building copper-refining operations in Zambia.

One feature of the proposed structure is designed specifically to pull in foreign investors. Subscribers would buy shares in naira but would have the option to receive dividends in US dollars, drawn from the refinery's projected $6.4 billion in annual export revenue. Dangote has explained the logic plainly: "You buy in naira, but you get dividends in dollars." The mechanism addresses what he has long described as Africa's biggest investment challenge, currency devaluation that erodes the real returns of local-currency assets. The dollar dividend structure is currently under active review by both the SEC and the Nigerian Exchange.

The cross-border ambition of the listing sets it apart from any IPO Africa has seen before. Nigerian Exchange Group convened the chief executives of five major African exchanges in Lagos on April 1, bringing together representatives from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, Ghana Stock Exchange, Nairobi Securities Exchange, Ethiopian Securities Exchange and the Bourse Regionale des Valeurs Mobilieres, which covers eight West African countries. The session was framed as a test case for continent-wide capital market integration, with the Dangote refinery as the vehicle.

Frank Mwiti, chief executive of the Nairobi Securities Exchange, confirmed he had traveled to Lagos to visit the refinery and fertilizer plant in person. "We discussed how the Nairobi Securities Exchange and other African exchanges can support what could be Africa's biggest IPO yet," he said.

The refinery is already running close to full capacity. It currently meets more than 90% of Nigeria's domestic petrol demand, has exported refined fuel to five African countries and has shipped jet fuel as far as the United Kingdom. The facility carries $3.65 billion in debt, which Dangote has said will be repaid through operational cash flows and asset transactions.

One unresolved question hangs over the whole exercise. With only 5% to 10% of the refinery on offer, exchange participants in Lagos raised concerns about whether the available float would be large enough to accommodate meaningful allocations across multiple exchanges simultaneously. How that question gets answered will determine whether this IPO becomes the blueprint Dangote says he intends it to be.