Airtel Africa Plc

Group revenue reached $1.85 billion, growing over 21% in constant currency and 31% in reported currency. Mobile Services constant-currency revenue rose 19.1%; data revenue increased 27.2%; mobile money revenue grew 25.8% in constant currency. EBITDA was $928 million, up 24.4% in constant currency and 36.6% in reported currency, with EBITDA margin at 51.1%, over 200 bps higher year over year. Excluding exceptional items, EPS was $0.54, up 57% year over year; basic EPS was $0.044, up 27.3%. CapEx was $389 million in Q1 versus $121 million a year ago, and full-year CapEx guidance remains $1.1 billion. Management said leverage is 0.5x and effective interest rate fell 282 bps to 10.1%. For Q2, they expect some additional margin pressure as higher energy costs flow into tower contracts; they also said the Airtel Money IPO remains targeted for 2026, with London the preferred listing venue, subject to market conditions.

Sunil Taldar struck an upbeat tone, saying the quarter reflected continued underlying demand, strong execution, and the benefits of long-term investment. He emphasized broad-based growth across voice, data, and mobile money, plus accelerating customer adoption and smartphone penetration, which he sees as evidence of structural demand in Airtel’s markets. Strategically, he highlighted aggressive reinvestment in coverage, capacity, 5G, home broadband, data centers, and enterprise services as the company’s way to capture that opportunity.

Kamal Dua focused on margin mechanics, saying Q1 EBITDA margin pressure from fuel costs was partly offset by cost programs and scale. He quantified the fuel impact as roughly 2.5% to 3% on EBITDA margins at the time of the prior update, with about half of that flowing through this quarter and the rest expected in Q2; he also said Q2 rates are already locked in contracts. He noted the company’s strong balance sheet and very modest leverage, and said the effective interest rate declined to 10.1%, which lowered the cost of debt. He also reiterated that Q1 CapEx was brought forward intentionally and that the full-year CapEx plan remains $1.1 billion.

Analysts focused on Nigeria growth, diesel/fuel pressure, CapEx discipline, M&A, satellite competition, and the Airtel Money IPO. Management said Nigeria continues to have large penetration and upgrade opportunities, with home broadband, B2B, data centers, and 5G cited as growth levers; the airtime-advance disruption from regulator-driven vendor changes was described as minimal at group level and not expected to affect Q2. On fuel, management said roughly half of the margin impact had hit in Q1 and the rest would follow in Q2, while on M&A they said they continue to look for sizable, attractive opportunities. On satellite services, Sunil Taldar framed them as complementary rather than competitive, and said Airtel is using them for enterprise connectivity, backhaul, and eventually direct-to-device services.