Safaricom reports strong half-year results as M-PESA drives growth

By:  Nana Appiah Acquaye

Safaricom PLC has posted strong financial performance for the Half Year ending September 2025, with service revenue in Kenya rising 9.3% to KShs. 194.0 billion, driven largely by M-PESA which contributed 45.4% of total service revenue at KSh. 88.1 billion.

M-PESA sustained double digit growth across markets, recording 37.9 million monthly active customers in Kenya. Transactions over the six-month period reached 21.9 billion, with a total value of KSh. 20.2 trillion. Of this, more than 13.2 billion transactions were processed under the free M-PESA Kadogo pricing band.

In Ethiopia, M-PESA continued to gain traction with 8.6 million one-month active customers and 84.74 million transactions valued at KSh. 11.74 billion over the period.

Merchant ecosystems expanded significantly in Kenya, with merchant numbers rising to 2.4 million. This included 0.9 million Lipa Na M-PESA tills and 1.5 million micro-merchants using Pochi La Biashara. Merchant payment value grew 15.1% to KSh. 1.2 trillion, including KSh. 1 trillion processed through Lipa Na M-PESA and KSh. 0.2 trillion via Pochi La Biashara. The combined merchant transaction volume surged 55.7% to 3.1 billion transactions.

M-PESA also enabled access to affordable digital credit for over 9.5 million customers, totaling KSh. 777.5 billion, with KSh. 629.2 billion accessed through the Fuliza overdraft facility.

Digital usage through the M-PESA Super Apps continued to rise with more than 5.8 million consumers and 347,000 businesses active monthly, generating over 624 million customer transactions and 67.3 million business transactions. Customers transacted KSh. 1.43 trillion while businesses transacted KSh. 512.1 billion through the Super App within the period.

Safaricom announced that it will continue to expand M-PESA’s capabilities, including building a unified app for telco and M-PESA services and rolling out new innovations in digital credit, savings and insurance. The company also plans to leverage the new M-PESA Fintech 2.0 platform to enable additional solutions for both customers and businesses.