This is from Quartz:

Jumia, the largest e-commerce operator in Africa, has today (April 12th) launched its landmark initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange.

The IPO marks a pivotal fork in the company’s journey since first launching operations in Nigeria in 2012 and expanding over time to 14 African countries with businesses across several verticals including food delivery, real estate, logistics, hotel and flight bookings.

The IPO priced the stock at $14.50. On Tuesday it closed at $43.04. Jumia started operations in Nigeria in 2012 but now has big markets in Cote d’Ivoire, Egypt, Kenya, Morocco, and South Africa. The firm is registered in Germany. South Africa’s MTN remains its largest shareholder.

In my view the most exciting thing about the listing is that it could result in the allocation of significant amounts of capital that is needed to unlock the Continent’s online retail market and link it to the wider world market. According to the FT: 

…. mobile broadband penetration in Africa was 32 per cent, or 399m subscribers, in 2017. This was expected to rise to 73 per cent by 2022, to more than 900m subscribers.

The company said that less than 1 per cent of retail sales in the countries it operated in were conducted online, against 24 per cent in China, a sign of how undeveloped the African online market was.

I also foresee African regulators moving to force Jumia to have more of its operations domiciled on the Continent — both to create jobs and for tax purposes. The company CEO recently erroneously claimed that African countries do not have enough developers to justify the fact that its development office is in Portugal (and headquarters in Germany).

More on this here.