The intelligence satisfies curiosity. The paid briefings satisfy strategy.
Every Monday, Elite subscribers receive an Investor Memo...
Subscribe nowThe Inside Story: Banking the Overlooked — How Bicycle-Parts Trader Idrissa Nassa Built a $9 Billion Bank Serving the Customers Everyone Else Ignored
In 1984 Idrissa Nassa moved bicycle parts across West African borders. Today he controls a $9 billion banking group in eleven countries — built by serving the traders big banks ignored — and just pledged to mobilise $712 million for Burkina Faso's hospitals and schools.
Related
The Inside Story: Two Fronts — How Patrice Motsepe Built a Mining Fortune and a Football Presidency, and the Week Both Came Under Pressure
In 1997 a young Johannesburg lawyer bought gold shafts the big miners were giving up. Today Patrice Motsepe runs African Rainbow Minerals and African football. This week both came under pressure: a lawsuit from his mining partner and unrest inside CAF. The man, and the two fronts.
The Inside Story: After Wigwe — How Herbert Wigwe Bought Access to the Top of Nigerian Banking, and What the Bank Has Become Without Him
In 2002 Herbert Wigwe and Aig Aig-Imoukhuede took over Access, then 65th of 89 Nigerian banks, and bought their way to the top. Since his death in February 2024 the shares have lagged every big rival. The story of the deal-maker, and of the bank he left behind.
The Inside Story: The Long Way Back — How Sudhir Ruparelia Was Expelled From Uganda at 16, Came Home With $25,000 and Built Its Largest Indigenous Bank
Expelled from Uganda at 16, Sudhir Ruparelia came home in 1985 with $25,000, opened the country's first licensed forex bureau and built its largest indigenous bank. Then the central bank took it over. As his London trial opens today, the story of the man and the bank.
The Inside Story: The Long Game — How Femi Otedola Rotated From Oil to Power to Banking and Took the Chair of Nigeria's Oldest Bank
Femi Otedola sold his oil business near its peak, built a power company worth more than ten times its listing value, then sold that too and put the money into Nigeria's oldest bank. Five years later he is its chairman and largest owner. The strategy behind his $815 million quarter.
Latest
South African banking billionaire Michiel le Roux under fire over political donations
The ANC Youth League has renewed its attack on Capitec founder Michiel le Roux, whose companies have given the Democratic Alliance at least R208 million.
Egyptian billionaire Samih Sawiris lines up daughter to lead family's film festival
Egyptian billionaire Samih Sawiris says the Sawiris family is handing the El Gouna Film Festival to its next generation, starting with his daughter Talia.
Famous Brands, built by South Africa's wealthy Halamandaris family, stumbles in Botswana
Famous Brands, the Steers and Wimpy owner co-founded by the Halamandaris family, expects interim earnings to drop as much as 33% after a Botswana writedown.
CIEL, controlled by Mauritius’s wealthy Dalais family, buys a women’s hospital in Uganda
C-Care, controlled by Mauritius's Dalais family through CIEL, has bought Kampala's Roswell Hospital, lifting its Ugandan network to six hospitals and 17 clinics.