$2 trillion of African savings: the challenge is no longer to raise capital, but to deploy it

Africa does not lack savings. According to Africa Finance Corporation's 2026 report on the continent's infrastructure, domestic non-bank capital exceeds 2,000 billion dollars. Pension funds and insurers hold more than 1,000 billion of it. The report draws a clear conclusion: the difficulty is no longer raising capital, but deploying it.

The signal from Nairobi

The Africa PPP summit will be held in Nairobi from 11 to 13 November 2026. It is organised by Kenya's Directorate of Public-Private Partnerships. Its common thread: turning infrastructure ambitions into projects ready to be financed. A full day is devoted to preparing such projects. Kenya itself sets the example: 51 public-private partnership projects, 10 of them under implementation, and a National Infrastructure Fund created to reduce reliance on public debt.

What this means

Pension funds and insurers have long-term liabilities. They look for real assets with regular revenues, in their own currency. But they only invest in prepared projects: signed offtake contracts, controlled costs, clear governance, well-allocated risks. The bottleneck is not capital. It is project preparation.

Our reading

• For a State, a well-prepared project opens access to regional savings without adding to its debt. The State remains the owner of the asset and decides at every stage.
• For an African institutional investor, what matters is access to a steady flow of projects that are clear, comparable and monitored over time.
• In between, the decisive work happens upstream: qualifying the asset, making it financeable, bringing the right partners together. That is the firm's business.

This text is a summary of public information as at the date of writing. It is neither an investment recommendation nor a rating.