MTN Nigeria Communications Plc (MTN Nigeria) recorded N100.491 billion profit after tax(PAT) in its unaudited results for the first quarter (Q1) ended March 31, 2023.
The unaudited Q1 results released on the Nigerian Exchange Limited showed that, revenue grew by 20.63 to N568.136 billion from N470.984 billion in Q1, 2022.
Operating profit stood at N206.619 billion as against N179.325 billion, an increase of 15.22 per cent. Profit before taxation was up to N155.784 billion from N143.587 billion, while profit for the period amounted to N100.491 billion from N96.819 billion. Earnings per share rose by 3.79 per cent to N4.94 compared to N4.76 in Q1, 2022.
Also, mobile subscribers increased by 9.4 per cent to 76.7 million, with an addition of 1.1 million subscribers in Q1, 2023; while active data users increased by 14.7 per cent to 41.2 million, recorded new 1.7 million active users in Q1, 2023
Active mobile money (MoMo PSB) wallets increased by 1.2 million in Q1 to 3.2 million, while service revenue increased by 20.5 per cent to N565.9 billion.
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) grew by 17.7 per cent to N302.7 billion, EBITDA margin declined by 1.3 percentage points (pp) to 53.3 per cent, while capital expenditure (Capex) declined by 25.8 per cent to N120.5 billion.
Speaking on the results, CEO of MTN Nigeria, Karl Toriola said: “we continued to experience headwinds in our operating environment in the first quarter of 2023. The impacts of the ongoing global macroeconomic and geopolitical developments on energy, food and general inflation were exacerbated locally by petrol and cash shortages experienced during the period.
“This placed additional pressure on economic activity, consumers and businesses. The private sector experienced the deepest contraction in March 2023 since the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, driving down the PMI index to 42.3 points from 44.7 points in February 2023.”
On outlook, Toriola said: “our focus is to continue enhancing the capacity of our network, accelerating 4G and 5G coverage to accommodate the rising data traffic and expanding rural coverage. We will continue to drive our home broadband strategy leveraging our 5G fixed wireless access device penetration and increased fibre deployment in key clusters to capture a significant share of market growth.”
