The prestigious ‘Forbes Global 2000’ list of the leading 2000 public companies in the world is out. Safaricom is the only Kenyan company on the list.
Out of the 2000 listed companies, only 17 are African. Ten of the public firms are from South Africa, three from Morocco, and two from Nigeria.
Banks and financial institutions have dominated the African list.
The list includes (profits in USD):
- Standard Bank Group ($2.1B) – South Africa
- Naspers ($13.5B) – South Africa
- FirstRand ($2.3B) – South Africa
- Sasol ($1.3B) – South Africa
- Absa Group ($1.1B) – South Africa
- NedBank ($1B) – South Africa
- Old Mutual ($1.1B) – South Africa
- Sanlam ($877M) – South Africa
- MTN Group ($658M) – South Africa
- RMB Holdings – South Africa
- Shoprite Holdings – South Africa
- Bid – South Africa
- Attijariwafa Bank ($608M) – Morocco
- Maroc Telecom ($640M) – Morocco
- Banque Centrale Populaire – Morocco
- Dangote Cement – Nigeria
- Zenith Bank ($534M) – Nigeria
- Safaricom ($2.4B) – Kenya
Forbes Global 2000
The Forbes Global 2000 is an annual ranking of the top 2,000 public companies in the world by Forbes magazine. The ranking is based on a mix of four metrics: sales, profit, assets and market value. The list has been published since 2003.
The Forbes Global 2000 is a useful indicator of which are the leading public companies in the world, but it is only an interpretation, as only public companies are listed. The results are not definitive; any change to the criteria would produce a different list.
