The International Monetary Fund has released a list of its debtors across the globe.
The list also parades the top 10 African countries with the largest debt profiles, as well as other debtor countries across continents.
The IMF is a global organisation supporting economic growth and prosperity of its 191 member countries. The international financial organisation’s list contains data on credit outstanding from September 1 to September 17, 2026.
The dataset details countries’ credit outstanding with the IMF, measured in Special Drawing Rights (SDR). The IMF noted that the SDR is equivalent to a “fractional amount of gold that was equivalent to one U.S. dollar.”
Based on the debt size of African countries on the list, Egypt, a North African country, tops the ranking, owing the IMF 7,861,227,527 SDR, equivalent to $10.7 billion.
Côte d’Ivoire, in West Africa, is second with 4,143,977,044 SDR in IMF debt, worth $5.65 billion, while Ghana, another West African country, ranks third with 2,986,726,500 SDR in IMF debt, equivalent to $4.075 billion.
Kenya, an East African country, ranks fourth on the IMF debt list among African countries, with 2,845,599,901 SDR in debt, equivalent to $3.88 billion. The Democratic Republic of the Congo is fifth, owing the IMF 2,426,925,004 SDR, approximately $3.312 billion.
With 2,230,908,346 SDR in IMF debt, equivalent to $3.044 billion, Angola ranks sixth among African countries, while Ethiopia ranks seventh, with 2,085,670,500 SDR in debt, equivalent to $2.846 billion.
Tanzania ranks eighth, with 1,662,220,000 SDR in IMF debt, equivalent to $2.268 billion. Zambia is ninth among the top 10 African countries indebted to the IMF, with 1,271,660,000 SDR, worth approximately $1.735 billion.
Cameroon ranks 10th with 1,098,710,000 SDR in debt to the IMF worth $1.499 billion.
Nigeria, the most populous African country, is not on the list because it had cleared its IMF debt incurred from loans obtained during the global pandemic in 2020. The President Bola Tinubu government cleared the $3.4 billion IMF loan in May, 2025.
Other African countries on the IMF’s debtors list include Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Benin Republic, Gabon, The Gambia, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Rwanda, Niger and Senegal.
Some of the non-African countries on the debtors’ list are Afghanistan, Albania, Argentina, Armenia
Bangladesh, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Costa Rica, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Georgia, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Jordan, Kosovo, Kyrgyz Republic, Maldives, Moldova, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, North Macedonia, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa and São Tomé and Príncipe.
