M&A in Africa last year was the classic one-trick pony, in that all the action took place in a single market, South Africa. Despite that, the competition for this award was fierce. It came down to a straight fight between Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, with the former walking away with the prize in yet another impressive year.
Goldman completed six deals in Africa ex-Egypt worth a total of $42 billion, for a 74.8% share of the market, according to Dealogic. Each of the transactions on the list involved a South African buyer or a South Africa-based seller, or both.
The biggest transaction of the year by far was the $39.8 billion share swap finalized by Cape Town-based Naspers and Dutch conglomerate Prosus in August 2021. Goldman advised Prosus, a technology investor that was spun out of Naspers in 2019 to hold the South African group’s international holdings, which includes a 29% stake in Chinese technology firm Tencent.
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