Safaricom Up 52 Per Cent In Net Profit For Half Year Ended September 2025

Safaricom PLC announced its half-year results for the 2025/2026 financial year (HY26), revealing a net income of USD 339.68 million (KES 42.8 billion), a huge 52.1% jump year-on-year.

Safaricom Kenya remains the foundation of the Group’s success, delivering USD 469 million in net income, which translates to a 23% growth year on year. The core driver is M-PESA, Safaricom’s mobile money transfer service, which grew by 14% to USD 699.21 million, contributing over 45% of the local service revenue.

This reflects a successful pivot toward Fintech 2.0, an AI-powered platform upgrade that has doubled transaction capacity. This evolution moves M-PESA beyond simple money transfer into a deeper financial ecosystem, especially with the introduction of new credit products like Taasi (launched in May 2025) aimed at supporting MSMEs and driving financial inclusion.

Crucially, the rise of mobile data grew 13.4%, overtaking voice as the primary connectivity revenue source, proves that the investments in 4G and 5G infrastructure are successfully monetising customer usage.

Despite earlier World Bank reports that the company was running into competitional and regulatory headwinds in Ethiopia, this unit achieved monumental commercial milestones in the period, nearly doubling its active customer base to over 11.15 million and growing its service revenue by a phenomenal 136% to USD 49.13 million. The network coverage now reaches 55% of the population.

This aggressive expansion confirms the Ethiopian market’s hunger for connectivity. Critically, M-PESA is gaining traction rapidly in Ethiopia, already boasting 3.4 million active users, laying the groundwork for a future revenue spike.

Although the Ethiopian subsidiary still reported a substantial loss (USD 105.56 million), this loss is significantly narrowing on an FX-neutral basis. The Group expects this unit to continue closing the gap toward profitability, which will eventually add billions to the Group’s bottom line.

“The results reflect a disciplined execution of our strategy and a relentless focus on our customers,” Safaricom CEO Peter Ndegwa remarked during the unveiling of the report. “We are confident in our path guided by key strategic pillars as envisioned in our strategy house.”