{"id":607111,"date":"2025-08-18T08:22:58","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T06:22:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=607111"},"modified":"2025-08-18T09:17:33","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T07:17:33","slug":"mtn-comeback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/business-telecoms\/607111-mtn-comeback.html","title":{"rendered":"MTN comeback"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

MTN’s financial performance during the first half of 2025 (H1 2025) was impressive, with service revenue and subscribers surging in two of its biggest markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the six months ending 30 June 2025, MTN Group’s service increased by 23.2% to R105.1 billion. On a constant currency basis, the figure increased 22.4%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) also jumped 60.6% from R29.05 billion to R46.66 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Total subscribers increased by 4.7% to 297.7 million, including active data subscribers and mobile money monthly active users climbing 10.3% to 164.4 million and 1.8% to 63.2 million, respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MTN Group CEO Ralph Mupita said the improvements were supported by improved macroeconomic conditions, characterised by greater stability in inflation and foreign exchange rates in key markets. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Blended average inflation across the Group was 14%, moderating slightly in Q2 to 13.8%, with lower inflation in the period in South Africa, Nigeria, and Ghana, our largest markets,” Mupita said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This supported an easing of interest rates in some markets, which also helped to alleviate the pressure on consumer spending power and business costs.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company also spent substantially more on upgrading its network to provide better network quality and capacity, with capital expenditure increasing 42.04% to R27.3 billion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

MTN’s biggest market by revenue and customers \u2014 Nigeria \u2014 contributed 37.5% more service revenue than over the same period last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The Nigerian naira exhibited greater stability against the US dollar in the first half, particularly when compared to H2 2024,” Mupita said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The approval of price adjustments in Nigeria, which were phased in during the period, largely benefiting Q2, boosted MTN\u00a0Nigeria and the Group’s service revenue expansion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MTN’s Ghana operations saw an even bigger improvement, with service revenue jumping 100.2% from R10.33 billion to R20.67 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Similar to the surge in Nigeria, a part of the Ghanaian cedi strengthened year-to-date in H1 against both our reporting currency, the rand, and the US dollar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The substantial growth means that the West African country is coming close to South Africa in terms of service revenue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Struggling in South Africa<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Ralph Mupita, MTN Group CEO<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On its home turf, MTN’s service revenue inched up 2.3% from R21.11 billion to R21.60 billion, supported primarily by its postpaid, wholesale, and enterprise segments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, Ebitda shrank 3.6% from R9.57 billion to R9.22 billion. The networks said its performance in South Africa was “resilient” but acknowledged that its prepaid segment was facing competitive pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“While inflation remained low in the period and interest rates were reduced, the South African economy recorded modest growth (GDP up 0.1% in Q1),” MTN said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Consumer confidence remained muted during the first half overall, though showed some improvement in Q2 2025.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mobile data traffic continued to grow substantially, with a 23% increase from H1 2024. Data revenues contributed 48.5% of MTN South Africa’s total service revenue during, up from 47.6% in H1 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The average postpaid MTN South Africa customers consumed 24.5GB in a month, an increase of 11.8% from the previous period. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A\u00a0significant portion of this growth was driven by the increasing adoption of fixed wireless access (FWA), as more customers embrace home connectivity solutions,” MTN said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“FWA delivered a pleasing performance with strong revenue growth, driven by higher traffic volumes and a 29.6% increase in subscribers.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MTN prepaid data users consumed 3.9GB data per month, up by 25.5% from H1 2024. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

MTN South Africa subscribers increased by 3.3% to 39.8 million, with postpaid customers growing 4.2% to 4.4 million and prepaid users rising by 1.7% to 29.5 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The table below compares key financial metrics from MTN’s H1 2024 and H1 2025 results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/th>H1 2024<\/th>H1 2025<\/th>Change<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Service revenue<\/td>R85.32 billion<\/td>R105.11 billion<\/td>+23.2%<\/strong><\/mark><\/td><\/tr>
EBITDA <\/td>R29.05 billion<\/td>R46.66 billion<\/td>+60.6%<\/strong><\/mark><\/td><\/tr>
Capex<\/td>R19.22 billion<\/td>R27.30 billion<\/td>+42.04%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Subscribers<\/td>284.3 million<\/td>297.7 million<\/td>+4.7%<\/mark><\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MTN put up an impressive financial performance during the first half of 2025, with service revenue and subscribers surging in two of its biggest markets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341042,"featured_media":590464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41906],"tags":[42,83667,11339,19188,1019,39564,72610],"class_list":["post-607111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-telecoms","tag-mtn","tag-mtn-ghana","tag-mtn-nigeria","tag-mtn-south-africa","tag-nigeria","tag-ralph-mupita","tag-south-african-telecoms"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607111"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341042"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607111"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607111\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":607146,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607111\/revisions\/607146"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/590464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}