First HoldCo Reports N3.4 Trillion Gross Earnings Despite Record Impairment Charge

By Love Oyedokun

Lagos, Nigeria – First HoldCo Plc, one of Nigeria’s leading financial services groups, has announced its unaudited financial results for the full year ended December 31, 2025, revealing a complex picture of growth alongside strategic balance sheet adjustments. While the Group reported a 4.8% year-on-year increase in gross earnings, reaching N3.4 trillion, a significant impairment charge impacted overall profitability.

Cablenews24 reports that the results reflect a year of deliberate strategic actions aimed at strengthening the Group’s financial foundation, improving asset quality, and positioning the business for more resilient and sustainable growth. These actions included successful capital raise activities and a proactive approach to addressing potential risks within its loan portfolio.

A key highlight of the results was the strong performance of First HoldCo’s core banking operations. Net interest income surged by 36.3% year-on-year to N1.9 trillion, driven by enhanced earnings yields and margins of 17.11% and 11.0%, respectively. This growth indicates the effectiveness of the Group’s lending strategies and its ability to generate strong returns from its core banking activities.

Net fees and commissions also saw a healthy increase of 18.7% year-on-year, reaching N290.7 billion. This growth was fueled by higher electronic banking fees, letters of credit commissions, custodian fees, and account maintenance income, demonstrating the continued success of the Group’s digital innovation strategy.

Despite the strong revenue growth, First HoldCo’s earnings for the year were lower than the previous year, primarily due to higher impairment charges in the commercial banking segment. This was a result of a deliberate strategic decision to accelerate balance sheet clean-up and adopt more aggressive provisioning standards.

Management views this as a prudent step that enhances transparency, strengthens investor confidence, and aligns fully with evolving regulatory expectations. By proactively addressing potential loan losses, First HoldCo aims to create a more resilient and sustainable business model for the future.

In addition to the impairment charge, First HoldCo’s profitability was also affected by increased regulatory costs. These charges, while weighing on the results, underscore the Group’s compliance with Nigeria’s financial system stability framework and its commitment to ensuring systemic confidence.

Despite these pressures, the underlying performance of the Group remains strong, demonstrating its ability to navigate a complex and evolving regulatory landscape.

Deposit liabilities grew by 10.0% year-on-year, driven by sustained deposit mobilization and continued investment in digital banking platforms. This growth reflects strong customer confidence and deepening engagement across key segments.

The deposit mix also showed a deliberate reduction in foreign currency deposits, resulting from the repayment of expensive funding and the impact of naira appreciation. This shift supports improved funding efficiency and reduces foreign exchange risk.

Gross loans and advances declined marginally, reflecting a disciplined approach to credit growth, strengthened risk management, loan repayments, write-offs, and the translation impact of a stronger naira on foreign currency facilities.

The Group intensified its commitment to ensuring a high-quality, cleaner asset base, aiming to optimize the portfolio and enhance future earnings potential.

Performance in earnings was impacted by a decline in non-interest income, mainly due to lower fair value gains on financial instruments following the naira appreciation in 2025. However, this was partially offset by stronger foreign exchange (FX) trading income and reduced FX revaluation losses.

Looking ahead, First HoldCo will continue to prioritize disciplined execution of its strategic objectives, with emphasizes on enhancing efficiency and profitability, continuing to build on the Group’s digital and data capabilities, while sustaining a robust balance sheet to support increased value creation and returns for shareholders.

Alongside this, the Group will pursue selective growth initiatives, including new revenue streams, additional business verticals, and deeper participation in targeted African markets, in line with our strategy and risk appetite.

Further details and insights are to be provided when the audited full-year results are published and during the subsequent investor and analyst earnings call.

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