Africa keeps its banks.
It’s losing its culture.

Where the continent builds its foundations, it keeps the equity. 17 of the 18 banks in the ledger are African-owned, and the pattern holds across energy, aviation, insurance and heavy industry — 32 of the 34brands in that backbone sit in domestic hands. The institutions that hold Africa’s savings and move its people are the ones Africa still controls.

Rank the continent’s brands by reach and value at stake and the summit belongs to someone else: Tecno, MultiChoice / DStv, Anglo American, Safaricom / M-Pesa, SAB (South African Breweries), Vodacom, Airtel Africa all sit under foreign control. The bigger the brand, the less likely Africa owns it — visibility and ownership have come apart at the very top.

The drift concentrates in the brands closest to daily life. Of the drinks, food, beauty and music brands in the ledger, only 3 are African-owned — the drink in the glass, the sound on the playlist and the product on the shelf are overwhelmingly foreign-held. Authorship stayed on the continent; the balance sheet went home with someone else.

Almost everywhere else, ownership has settled. Fintech has not: of 12 entries, 3 are retained, 6 exported and 3 contested — the highest live-ownership count on the board. It is the sector where the next decade of African value-capture is still being decided.