Debt issuance in sub-Saharan Africa fell to its lowest in three years in 2015 as shrinking currencies and faltering economies due to a fall in commodity prices kept borrowers at bay, a Thomson Reuters report showed.

A credit boom that had fuelled expansion in infrastructure projects across the region hit serious headwinds after borrowing costs rose last year in anticipation of a US Fed interest rate hike in nine years that finally materialized in December.

Governments in some of the poorest countries in the world borrowed $15.5 billion  last year, a 22 percent drop compared to 2014 and the lowest annual total since 2012.

South Africa, the continent’s second largest economy and the most industrialized, issued the most debt with $5.5 billion in bond proceeds which accounted for slightly over a third of the regions debt market activity. Ivory Coast followed closely with 28 percent market share worth $4.3 billion in proceeds.

The Republic of Angola offered the largest bond issuance in 2015 “with its $1.5 billion sovereign debt in the form of Eurobonds”.

African states and companies are expected to remain averse towards the international capital markets this year as the US Fed hikes rates further and a slowdown in the Chinese economy — the region’s largest trade partner — hurts revenue for many countries.

Despite the slowdown on the debt market, companies on the continent are attracting increasing investor attention due to spending power of the rising middle class and expansion of the continent natural resources.

The Reuters report said the overall value of reported mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in sub-Saharan Africa jumped by a hefty 73 percent in 2015 compared to the previous year.

“The value of announced M&A transactions with any sub-Saharan African involvement reached $66.7 billion for 2015, 73 percent more than the value registered during 2014,” Thomson Reuters Africa Managing Director Sneha Shah said.