By Airtel Africa grew her revenues by 21.1 percent to $4,955m grew in constant currency but declined by 0.5% in reported currency as currency devaluation impacted reported revenues, according to results for year ended 31 March 2025.
The African brand report revealed that strong execution and the tariff adjustments in Nigeria contributed to a further quarter of accelerating growth, with Q4’25 revenue growth of 23.2% in constant currency, and 17.8% in reported currency as currency headwinds eased.
According to the figures, for the year ended 31 March 2025, underlying EBITDA declined by 5.1% in reported currency to $2,304m with underlying EBITDA margins of 46.5% compared to 48.8% in the prior year, impacted by increased fuel prices and the lower contribution of Nigeria to the Group.
“However, following a more stable operating environment and benefits from our cost efficiency programme, underlying EBITDA margins have expanded from 45.3% in Q1’25 to 47.3% in Q4’25”, the company report stated.
Airtel Africa said: “We have been consistently reducing our foreign currency debt exposure, having paid down $702m of foreign currency debt over the year. Furthermore, 93% of our OpCo debt (excl. lease liabilities) is now in local currency, up from 83% a year ago.”
Indeed, across the Group, mobile services revenue grew by 19.6% in constant currency, driven by voice revenue growth of 10.6% and data revenue growth of 30.5% while mobile money revenue grew by 29.9% in constant currency.
Commenting on the result, Chief Executive Officer, Mr Sunil Taldar, said: “We have reported another strong operating performance as our strategy continues to deliver against the significant opportunity that exists across our markets.”
He said, “The focus on our refreshed strategy has seen continued investment in the network while also driving improvements in our digital platforms and offerings to further enhance the customer experience.
“This has enabled increased digital inclusion with a further 20% growth in our smartphone customers to 74.4m, contributing to a 47.5% increase in data traffic over the year. Furthermore, Airtel Money continues to support financial inclusion with customers increasing 17.3% to 44.6 million and an expanding ecosystem underpinning the $136bn transaction value, which increased 32% in constant currency.
“An improving operating environment and focused execution contributed to strong momentum in our financial results with constant currency revenue growth peaking at 23.2% in Q4’25. Part of this acceleration in the last quarter has also been driven by the Nigerian tariff adjustments.
According to him, this accelerating revenue growth and cost optimisation programme has supported quarterly EBITDA margin expansion during the year, noting, “underlying EBITDA margins increased by 200bps from 45.3% in Q1’25 to 47.3% in Q4’25, and we remain focussed on further EBITDA margin improvements subject to macroeconomic stability. This, combined with our robust capital structure and disciplined capital allocation, puts us in a strong position to continue investing in network capacity to deliver continued growth.”
Taldar said further that Airtel Africa is making significant progress in preparations for the Airtel Money IPO and remain committed to this objective, stressing, “we are also mindful of evolving market conditions. Therefore, subject to these conditions, we anticipate a listing event in the first half of calendar year 2026.
“The recent stability in the operating environment is encouraging, however we remain conscious of global developments that may impact our business. We will remain focused on delivering our strategy to transform the lives of our customers and support economic prosperity across our markets. I want to say a particular thank-you to our customers, partners, governments and regulators for their support and our employees for their unrelenting contribution to the business.”
