Safaricom Kenya net income up 14.1pc to Ksh.47.5 billion

Safaricom on Thursday announced it recorded a 14.1 per cent growth in net income for its Kenyan unit to Ksh. 47.5 billion in the six months ended September 30.

Service revenue meanwhile grew by 12.9 per cent to Ksh.177.5 billion, making Kenya’s largest telco’s earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) climb 18 per cent to Ksh.79.2 billion.

Safaricom said it recorded a six per cent growth in monthly active customers to 35.3 million.

The company’s 2025 first-half-year financials also show a four per cent growth in the number of users on its mobile money platform M-Pesa, which now has 33.5 million monthly active customers.

M-Pesa revenue saw a 16.6 per cent year-on-year (YoY) growth to Ksh.77.2 billion. This was 42.9 per cent of Safaricom’s revenue.

Mobile connectivity business – voice, data and SMS – contributed 52.2 per cent of the telco’s revenue at Ksh.93.9 billion, with connectivity customers growing six per cent YoY to 34.9 million.

However, Safaricom Group’s net income shrank by 17.7 per cent YoY because of the performance of its Ethiopia unit, where the company said the depreciation of the birr currency had a Ksh.33.8 billion impact on net income.

The Ethiopian birr has depreciated to the dollar by 106.3 per cent from the June rate of ETB 57.69 to 118.99 at the close of September.

“We remain optimistic about the commercial success of this venture even as we increase our customer acquisition efforts and continue to innovate to deliver value to our customers,” CEO Peter Ndegwa said of the Ethiopia unit, which Safaricom opened in October 2022.

The company’s Chief Finance Officer Dilip Pal said they expect the impact of the foreign exchange regime reforms in the second half of the “to be much lower and consequently lower impact to the Group bottom line.”