MTN Nigeria’s profit surge hits ₦546 billion in Q1 2026
On Techpoint Digest, we discuss MTN Nigeria's ₦95.5 billion handover of MoMo to its parent company, Kenya launching its own TikTok, UrbanTok, and Somalia quietly developing its cybersecurity rules.
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Tungjatjeta,<br />
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Victoria from Techpoint here,<br />
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Here’s what I’ve got for you today:<br />
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MTN Nigeria’s profit surge hits ₦546 billion<br />
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Kenya launches its own TikTok, UrbanTok<br />
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Somalia is quietly building its cybersecurity rulebook<br />
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MTN Nigeria’s profit surge hits ₦546 billion<br />
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MTN Nigeria<br />
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MTN Nigeria just dropped its Q1 2026 numbers, and they’re hard to ignore. The telco posted a pre-tax profit of ₦546.4 billion, up nearly 170% year-on-year, on revenue of ₦1.49 trillion, its highest quarterly haul in years. After-tax profit came in at ₦355.5 billion, while earnings per share jumped 166% to ₦16.95. Investors didn’t need time to process it. The stock jumped over 6% in a day to ₦870, pushing MTN Nigeria to the top spot as the most valuable company on the Nigerian Exchange. This doesn’t look like recovery anymore. It looks like momentum.<br />
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Under the hood, the growth is coming from everywhere that matters. Data revenue rose 56%, helped by more smartphone users and heavier Internet consumption; Nigerians are now averaging over 14GB per month. Voice is still growing, but fintech is where things get interesting. Revenue there jumped nearly 78%, and if you strip out XtraTime — MTN’s suspended airtime lending product — core fintech revenue surged over 190%. There’s also a quieter but important shift: foreign exchange, which used to drag earnings down, flipped into a ₦33 billion gain this quarter. At the same time, MTN is cutting debt, paying down over ₦150 billion.<br />
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To understand how big this turnaround is, you have to rewind. Just two years ago, MTN Nigeria was deep in the red, hit by massive forex losses and rising costs it couldn’t pass on to customers. Tariffs hadn’t been adjusted in a decade. By 2024, the company posted a ₦399 billion loss. Then came the reset: the naira stabilised, and regulators approved a long-awaited tariff hike in early 2025. By the end of that year, MTN was back in profit, and Q1 2026 suggests that wasn’t a one-off bounce but a struct...
