MTN Nigeria’s Q1 2026 profit surges 165.9% to $258.5m

MTN Nigeria Communications Plc has reported a strong start to the year, with profit after tax surging 165.9% to ₦355.5 billion($258.5 million) in the first quarter of 2026, up from ₦133.7 billion in the same period of 2025.

The impressive performance, announced in the company’s unaudited Q1 2026 financial results released on Thursday, was primarily driven by robust growth in data consumption and digital financial services.

Service revenue jumped 41.8% to approximately ₦1.49 trillion from ₦1.05 trillion a year earlier. Data revenue, the key growth engine, rose 56.2% year-on-year, supported by a 22.9% increase in data traffic and a 12.3% rise in average data usage per subscriber to 14.3 GB. Smartphone penetration also climbed 5.5 percentage points to 66.2%.

The telecom operator added 2.3 million revenue-generating subscribers during the quarter, bringing its total subscriber base to 89.5 million — a 6.5% increase from Q1 2025. Active data subscribers grew even faster, rising 9.5% to 55.0 million.

EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation) expanded significantly by 68.1% to ₦828.3 billion, pushing the EBITDA margin up by 8.7 percentage points to 55.3%. This reflects strong operating leverage and effective cost management, despite rising energy costs towards the end of the quarter.

Free cash flow also improved markedly, highlighting enhanced operational efficiency even as the company ramped up network investments. Capital expenditure (excluding right-of-use assets) surged 92.8% to ₦390.3 billion, with a significant portion directed towards expanding fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) and fixed wireless access to capture opportunities in the home broadband segment.

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MTN Nigeria ended the quarter with a positive net cash position of ₦129.0 billion, up from ₦104.8 billion at the close of December 2025. The company also fully repaid all outstanding foreign currency loans, reducing its exposure to foreign exchange volatility. Earnings per share more than doubled to ₦16.95 from ₦6.37.

Commenting on the results, MTN Nigeria CEO Karl Toriola attributed the performance to disciplined execution amid a challenging environment.

“The first quarter of 2026 underscores the strength of our execution and the resilience of our business model in a complex and evolving operating environment. We sustained strong commercial momentum, maintained disciplined cost management and accelerated investment in our network,” Toriola said.

In the fintech space, MTN Nigeria is advancing the structural separation of its digital financial services business. The company has proposed selling a 60% stake in its MoMo Payment Service Bank and Y’ello Digital Financial Services to MTN Group Fintech Holdings, while retaining 40% ownership and receiving a ₦152.1 billion capital injection. However, the results highlighted emerging regulatory headwinds in the digital lending segment.