Abolaji Adebayo 
Telecom provider, Airtel Africa, has revealed a rise in its net profit to the tune of $132 million in the third quarter (October-December) of its financial year 2025.
The company in its Financial Report Q3’25 released on Thursday attributes the surge in its profit to a sudden appreciation in several African currencies, such as the Nigerian naira and Tanzanian shilling.
Attributable to the owners of the company, this compares to a net loss of $6 million in Q3FY24.
It also reported a 2.42 per cent rise in revenues to $1.26 billion, up from $1.23 billion in Q3FY24.
The rise in revenue was a reversal of the 2.6 per cent and 16.1 per cent declines in revenue announced in the preceding two quarters.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) were recorded at $594 million, 1.98 per cent lower than $606 million in the same quarter of the previous year. Ebitda has been falling due to increased fuel prices and the lower contribution of Nigeria to the Airtel Africa Group.
Importantly, profit after tax benefited from an exceptional gain of $94 million as a result of currency changes, the company said.
This follows exceptional derivative and foreign exchange losses of $71 million and $80 million due to currency devaluation in Q2 and Q1, respectively.
With operations in 14 sub-Saharan African countries, Airtel Africa is among the largest telecommunications providers on the continent.
The total customer base in the latest quarter expanded by 7.9 per cent to 163.1 million, as mobile data and mobile money service penetration continued to climb.
The quarter saw a 13.8 per cent surge in data customers to 71.4 million and an 18.3 per cent increase in mobile money customers to 44.3 million.
Data usage per customer increased by 32.3 per cent to 6.9 GB, with smartphone penetration increasing by 5.2 per cent to reach 44.2 per cent in Q3. Airtel Africa renewed its licence in Kenya and Chad during the quarter.
The company states that it has been actively reducing its forex exposure across the group over the past few years to mitigate the impact of any potential future devaluation and has reduced its foreign currency debt exposure by $739 million in the past year.
Ninety-two per cent of the debt of its operating company, excluding lease liabilities, is now in local currency, up from 79 per cent a year ago.
This, together with continued confidence in the outlook for the business, has enabled the company’s board to announce a second share buyback programme, which will return up to $100 million to shareholders.
Capital expenditure of $456 million was 7.8 per cent lower compared to the prior period. Meanwhile, its capex guidance for the full year remains at $725 million-$750 million.
Speaking on the trading update, Chief Executive Officer, Sunil Taldar, said: “We have delivered an improvement in both the operating and financial performance in the last quarter driven by our refined strategy which is focussed on delivering great customer experience across all touch points.
“An increasingly important component of this is to provide a best-in-class network, digitise and simplify the customer journey.
“Our focus on speed and quality execution is enabling us to unlock the substantial opportunities for growth across our markets and business segments, where demand remains significant, resulting in a further acceleration of constant currency revenue growth to 21.3% in the most recent quarter.
“We remain committed to investing for the future by expanding our distribution and network to ensure that we capture this significant growth opportunity on offer. Despite the challenging environment for many of our customers, we continue to see strong demand for our services as we enable connectivity and facilitate access to the digital economy.
“The scale of data traffic growth across our markets – an increase of 49% over the last year – is a testament to the investments we have made and the relentless focus on our strategy to create value for all our stakeholders.
“As we have communicated previously, our cost efficiency programme continues to deliver EBITDA margin improvements, with a further expansion of margins in Q3’25. We continue to focus on further margin improvement. Furthermore, our capital structure remains robust with just 8% of OpCo debt in foreign currency – a substantial improvement over the last year.
“This, together with continued confidence in the outlook for the business, has enabled the Board to announce a second share buyback programme, which will return up to $100m to shareholders.
“The recent signs of currency stabilisation in some markets and the recent decision from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) regarding tariff adjustments in Nigeria are encouraging and signal a more stable and supportive operating environment. While challenges remain, these developments provide a firm foundation for growth and improved market conditions.”
