MTN Nigeria has recorded total revenue of N975.76 billion for the third quarter ended September 30, 2020, which is above N856.549 billion that was recorded in the corresponding period of 2019.
Highlight of the financial statement shows that operating profit increased by 7.8% from N284.73 billion in 2019 to N307.01 billion in 2020.
The growth in operating profit was largely impacted by the increase in finance costs as a result of increased borrowings, leading to a decline of 0.6% in profit before tax to N211.6 billion.
Other factors which impacted the company performance includes, Mobile subscribers increased by 3.9 million to 75million. Active data users increased by 1.7 million to 30.7 million. Service revenue increased by 13.9% to N973.8 billion.
Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) grew by 9.1% to N497.9 billion. EBITDA margin declined by 2.3 percentage point (pp) to 51.0%, due to cost pressures arising mainly from increased investments in the firm’s network and the impact on costs of the depreciation to the CBN and NAFEX exchange rates.
Profit before Tax (PBT) declined by 0.6% to N211.6 billion. Earnings Per Share (EPS) declined by 3.3% to N7.1 kobo.
Commenting on the rationale behind the revenue growth in the latest financials posted by the firm, the CEO of MTN Nigeria, Ferdi Moolman, said, “Following a decline in voice traffic and an acceleration in data during lockdowns in Q2, we have seen a normalization of traffic as restrictions have been removed, with a recovery voice traffic and continued growth in data. This has supported a 13.9% growth in service revenue, with an acceleration of growth to 16.5% in Q3 specifically.”
