N$4.9bn invested into unlisted businesses

Namibia’s unlisted investment market is expanding rapidly, with billions of dollars now invested in privately held businesses as institutional investors look beyond the stock exchange for opportunities.

The unlisted investment market has grown to N$6.4 billion in committed capital, with N$4.9 billion already deployed into portfolio companies, according to the Namibia Financial Institutions Supervisory Authority (Namfisa).

The growth shows that there is an increasing role of private equity funds and special purpose vehicles in providing capital to businesses that are not listed on the Namibia Securities Exchange.

Namfisa’s Second Quarterly Report for 2026 shows that committed capital increased by 37.1% over the past year and 21% over six months.

The regulator said “total committed capital increased by 21% over the past six months and by 37.1% year on year to N$6.4 billion”.

The N$4.9 billion actually invested in unlisted companies was up 34.1% from the previous year.

Agriculture leads investment

Namfisa says “the primary sectors of investment were agriculture, forestry and fishing, electricity and water and manufacturing”.

Agriculture, forestry and fishing attracted the largest portion of the unlisted investment market, accounting for 15.7% of total investments.

Electricity and water followed at 14.3%, while manufacturing accounted for 9.8%.

Other areas included information technology and communication at 7%, meat processing at 5.5% and transportation at 5.4%.

Debt catches
up with equity

The structure of the financing is also changing.

Equity financing accounted for 51.1% of total financing, down from 63.5%, while debt financing increased to 48.9%.

This means debt is now almost as large a source of funding as equity within the unlisted investment market.

Namfisa says the figures “indicate a growing preference for channelling new funds through equity focused special purpose vehicles”.

Three managers control more than half

The market remains concentrated among a relatively small number of investment managers.

Namfisa reports that the three largest unlisted investment managers accounted for 53.2% of committed capital.

“The top three unlisted investment managers based on committed capital accounted for 53.2% of the market share.”

Eos Capital held the largest share at 25.4%, followed by Ino Harith Capital at 20% and Old Mutual Alternative Investments (Namibia) Ltd at 7.8%.

The companies receiving the funding employed 9 917 people during the period, comprising 7 249 permanent and 2 668 temporary workers.

Namfisa says the employment figures were a 24.9% increase from the previous period.

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