These are the 12 biggest companies in South Africa

Fortune has this week reported that China has now reached parity with the United States, accounting for 129 companies on the 2019 Fortune Global 500 list, versus 121 from the US.

The top 500 list of companies is based on total revenues for their respective fiscal years.

The magazine’s latest data shows that three Chinese firms – Sinopec Group, China National Petroleum and State Grid – made it into the top 10, while six of the top 10 firms posting the fastest ranking growth came from China, including tech giants Alibaba and Tencent.

The Fortune 500 list follows an annual Global 2000 list, ranking the world’s largest public companies – including those from South Africa.

Standard Bank is the largest company in South Africa, ahead of Naspers and FirstRand, although it slipped down the overall ranking in 2019.

Absa Group, along with Nedbank and Old Mutual, feature on the 2019 list, having not been included in recent years, with the likes of MMI Holdings and Remgro slipping down, and off the list, from previous rankings of 1,559 and 1,808 respectively.

The biggest companies in South Africa (in US$bn)

2019	2018	Company	Sales	Profits	Assets	Market Value
415	376	Standard Bank Group	9.0	2.1	147.9	22.9
418	531	Naspers	6.9	13.5	35.8	111.3
445	470	FirstRand	7.6	2.3	110.0	27.2
530	509	Sasol	14.8	1.3	32.0	21.0
661	–	Absa Group	9.7	1.1	89.0	9.9
755	–	Nedbank	7.7	1.0	72.0	9.4
782	–	Old Mutual	8.2	1.1	60.7	8.3
818	702	Sanlam	5.8	0.88	55.9	12.4
936	1069	MTN Group	10.2	0.66	17.0	13.5
1764	1832	RMB Holdings	4.0	0.74	3.6	8.3
1881	1325	Shoprite Holdings	11.0	0.34	4.7	7.0
1981	1972	Bid Corp	9.4	0.25	4.4	7.2