For more than 50 years, Ethiopia had no stock exchange. If you wanted to invest in one of the country’s biggest companies, you simply couldn’t. However, since it launched its bourse in January 2025, Ethiopia has never looked back. In its eighteen-month existence so far, the Ethiopian Securities Exchange (ESX) has slowly but steadily courted banks and telecoms companies.
Abay Bank, an Ethiopian mid-tier lender with ETB 91.3 billion ($566 million) in assets, has become the fifth company to list on the stock exchange. It is also the fourth private bank to join the exchange, following Wegagen Bank, Gadaa Bank, and Awash Bank. In May, Ethio Telecom became the first non-financial company to list after attracting over 47,000 investors in its public share offer.
A stock exchange is a marketplace where investors can buy and sell shares in companies. It gives businesses access to capital to grow while allowing ordinary people and institutions to own a piece of those businesses. Abay Bank’s listing does not involve selling new shares to the public. Instead, it gives existing shareholders a regulated market where those shares can be traded more easily and transparently.
The listing marks something much bigger. Ethiopia is building the financial infrastructure that many of the world’s fastest-growing economies have relied on for decades. Deep capital markets make it easier for companies to raise money, investors to build wealth, and governments to attract long-term investment. Private companies that stay outside regulated capital markets could find it harder to attract investors as Ethiopia’s exchange grows, given that the country is not a major destination for private capital.
In 2025, Ethiopia recorded no disclosed startup raises, according to Africa: The Big Deal; however, African Business, a pan-African publication, estimated that Ethiopian-headquartered startups attracted less than $80 million in foreign capital across 2024 and 2025 combined. Dodai, the e-mobility startup that raised a $13 million Series A round in March, has been the country’s bright spot.