African fintech startup funding dropped by 58% in Q3 2022

African fintech startups have always taken the lion share when it comes to funding in the African tech ecosystem. However, data from CB Insights suggests that investments in the sector have dropped significantly in Q3 2022.

In the second quarter of 2022, funding for startups across various regions in the world started witnessing a decline, but it appeared that African startups were immune to this global slowdown. But as the year progressed, the numbers showed that funding to African startups had decreased.

According to the CB Insights State of Fintech Q3 2022 report, African startups raised $161 million in Q3 2022, which was significantly less than the previous two quarters with $383 million in Q2 and $369 million in Q1.

The number of deals has also dropped from 74 in Q1 2022 to 43 in Q3 2022; while Q2 2022 had 61 deals.

Despite the slowdown, one thing is still consistent across all the quarters. Which is that early-stage fintech startups still raise the most money with 90% of deals announced so far, 2% more than 2021’s numbers. Furthermore, there haven’t been any mega-deals so far (defined as deals above $100 million).

The biggest deal in the continent so far is TeamApt's $50 million raise, and this constitutes 30% of the recorded fintech funding. The report also highlighted quite unsurprisingly that the number of mergers and acquisitions has increased, with 18 M&As so far.

At the global scene, fintech funding fell 38% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) to hit $12.9B — matching Q4 2020’s level.