Safaricom Half-Year Net Profit Grows to Sh34.2B

Safaricom’s net profit for the six months ended September increased to Sh34.2 billion due to increased customer spending and growth in the Ethiopian unit.

This is an improvement over a 10% drop in profit after tax to Sh33.5 billion during the same period last year.

Customers increased their spending after the telco cut prices earlier in the year.

Safaricom has reduced data prices, outgoing call rates per minute, and the M-Pesa tariff by 65 percent, 44 percent, and 61 percent, respectively, since 2020.

“We have delivered a great set of results largely by supporting our customers with enhanced value and reduced prices on our products and services,” Peter Ndegwa, Safaricom CEO, said.

“We appreciate that everyone is going through a hard time and are committed as a business to support our customers cope,” Ndegwa added.

“The reduced prices have seen our customers use more of our services hence the double-digit growth in profitability and revenue.”

Safaricom Ethiopia launched M-Pesa services in the country, which resulted in increased revenue.

For instance, in less than two months, the Ethiopian unit registered 1.2 million customers on the platform.

“This confirms what we have been saying about Ethiopia in terms of how it will significantly support our growth into the future. We are looking to maintain this momentum in the second half of the year,” he said.

Ethiopia’s data usage was higher than Kenya’s in September, with 4.3 gigabytes per customer compared to 3.7 for Kenya.

“We see more opportunities with M-PESA and mobile data, though coming off a small base. We are particularly impressed with the usage levels in mobile data. Such levels were only realized in Kenya after close to 10 years of operations,” Ndegwa said.