Africa's credit agency is about $3.5 trillion, not just ratings
Africa has about $4 trillion in domestic capital and fewer than 4,000 credit ratings. A UCT expert explains how AfCRA can put that money to work at home.
Cape Town — The new Africa Credit Rating Agency (AfCRA) is often described as a rival to Fitch, Moody's and S&P. Misheck Mutize of the University of Cape Town's Graduate School of Business, who advises the African Union on credit ratings, argues in The Conversation that its real job is bigger: getting Africa's own money working for Africa.
The numbers
- Africa's domestic capital base: about $4 trillion, held by pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, banks and insurers.
- Capital invested without any formal rating: more than $3.5 trillion.
- Ratings in Africa at the end of 2025: fewer than 4,000. The EU had 823,000; the US more than 2 million.
Much African savings sit in short-term instruments such as 90-day treasury bills, because investors lack the information to commit long term.
What AfCRA can do
1. Rate more borrowers and bring credit analysis to the trillions now unrated. 2. Build information: the value of a rating lies in its evidence and context, not just a letter grade. 3. Separate real risk from perceived risk, helping investors see past weaknesses that are amplified by thin data. 4. Move capital into infrastructure, energy and manufacturing, which create jobs.
The signal
Global agencies are buying local expertise: S&P is acquiring a majority stake in Nigeria's Agusto & Co, and Moody's has bought GCR Ratings and the West Africa Rating Agency. To Mutize, that confirms that local knowledge matters in judging African risk. AfCRA's success, he says, should be measured by the roads, power and factories it helps finance.
Source: The Conversation, 4 October 2026.
