According to Forbes World’s Billionaires List 2024, Aliko Dangote and Abdulsamad Rabiu’s combined wealth fell by $3.8 billion in a single year.
 Every person who has been verified as a billionaire is ranked and their net worth is continuously updated on Forbes’ wealth-tracking website. Every five minutes, while the corresponding stock markets are open, the value of each person’s publicly traded holdings is updated.
See also: In Q1 2024, Femi Otedola, valued at $1.7 billion, re-enters Forbes’ list of billionaires.
Four billionaires from Africa’s largest economy are listed on the annual list; South Africa has six, and Egypt has five.
On the 2024 World’s Billionaire List, Dangote and Rabiu’s wealth decreased by 16.9% to $18.6 billion from $22.4 billion the year before.
According to a breakdown of the statistics, Rabiu’s wealth decreased by $3.0 billion to $5.2 billion, while Dangote’s wealth decreased by $0.8 billion to $13.4 billion. However, Mike Adenuga’s net worth increased to $6.7 billion from $0.6 billion.
For the first time in twelve years, Forbes revealed in June of last year that Dangote had lost his position as the richest person in Africa. It stated that South African Johann Rupert, who amassed a fortune in luxury products among other things, had surpassed the Nigerian industrialist.
It continued, “The CBN’s decision to float its currency, the naira, on June 14 and abandon the fixed exchange rate with the U.S. dollar, is what has caused the decline in Dangote’s fortune.”
In June of last year, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) reinstated the willing buyer, willing seller paradigm and combined all FX market sectors under the Investors and Exporters window.
As of April 2, the official currency rate dropped from N463.38/$ to N1,278.58/$. The value of the naira dropped to 1,260/$ from 762/$ on the black market.
“Their wealth would have been impacted by the devaluation of the naira since the currency has lost value in relation to the dollar,” Abiodun Keripe, managing director of Afrinvest Consulting Limited, stated.
He continued by saying that the billionaires’ majority of their companies are in Nigeria and that they would incur losses when they converted their naira to dollar valuations.
Dangote passed Rupert to take the top spot as Africa’s richest person in January.
Otedola, the chairman of Geregu Power, returned with a $1.4 billion net worth, according to the Forbes list.
Forbes stated, “Otedola’s return can be credited for all of that gain. He was last listed on the Forbes Africa list in 2017 when he owned a majority position in fuel distributor Forte Oil.”
According to the American business magazine’s most recent billionaire index, there are 2,781 billionaires worldwide—141 more than the previous year and 26 more than the record set in 2021.
“They have amassed an aggregate wealth of $14.2 trillion, surpassing the previous record set in 2021 by $1.1 trillion and up $2 trillion from 2023. They are wealthier than ever before. Two-thirds of the list’s members are worth more than a year ago; only one-fourth are poorer,” the report stated.
It further stated that the US, which currently has a record 813 billionaires with a combined $5.7 trillion, and the top 20 have contributed a collective $700 billion in wealth since 2023, accounting for a large portion of the growth.
Despite low consumer spending and a real estate bubble that helped wipe out about $300 billion in wealth, China is still in second place with 473 (including Hong Kong) valued at $1.7 trillion. India comes in third place with 200 billionaires, which is also a record.
