The World Investment Report 2026 recorded Egyptian inflows of precisely $15.453 billion in 2025, down $31.125 billion, or 66.8 percent, from a revised $46.578 billion in 2024.
The decline was largely because the previous year's figures were boosted by the $35 billion Ras El-Hekma deal
UNCTAD said Egypt “remained the largest recipient of FDI in Africa,” accounting for more than one-fifth of the continent’s total inflows and approximately 69 percent of investment entering North Africa in 2025.
However, Egypt’s “underlying inflows increased by about one-fourth” in 2025, supported by the $3.5 billion Alam El-Roum deal.
Egypt also attracted four of Africa’s 10 largest international project-finance deals announced in 2025, representing more than a quarter of the continent’s total project-finance value.
The report’s annex confirms that Egypt has led Africa since 2022, when it attracted $11.4 billion. Inflows subsequently stood at $9.84 billion in 2023 before surging to $46.58 billion in 2024.
Globally, however, Egypt dropped out of the 20 largest FDI recipients in 2025.
Africa’s inflows remain strong
Across Africa, FDI inflows fell by 26 percent to $69.5 billion in 2025 from $94.3 billion in 2024, with the previous year’s total inflated by a small number of unusually large transactions, particularly Ras El-Hekma.
Despite the decline, the 2025 inflows were around one-third higher than Africa’s 2010–2024 average and represented the continent’s third-highest annual inflow in 25 years.
Excluding exceptional one-off peaks in South Africa in 2021 and Egypt in 2024, UNCTAD described the result as Africa’s “strongest performance in recent decades.”
After Egypt, the largest FDI recipients in Africa were Guinea ($7.7 billion), Mozambique ($5.6 billion), Nigeria ($4 billion), Ethiopia ($3.7 billion), Uganda ($3.3 billion), Morocco ($3.3 billion) and Kenya ($3.2 billion).
Guinea’s inflows increased more than fivefold, driven by bauxite and iron-ore mining projects. Mozambique benefited mainly from hydrocarbon and liquefied-natural-gas projects, while Nigeria’s increase was supported by oil- and gas-related project-finance deals.
Investment entering North Africa fell by 56 percent to $22.4 billion, primarily because of the Ras El-Hekma-related comparison base. In contrast, West African inflows increased by 44 percent to $19.6 billion, while East Africa recorded a 12 percent rise to $14.6 billion.
Southern African inflows declined by 21 percent to $8.1 billion, partly because South Africa registered negative inflows of $2.3 billion. Central African inflows also fell by 21 percent to $4.8 billion.
Globally, FDI increased by 6 percent to $1.624 trillion in 2025, although UNCTAD cautioned that the recovery remained concentrated in a limited number of large economies and strategic sectors. Developed-economy inflows rose by 11 percent, compared with growth of only 2 percent in developing economies.
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