First HoldCo’s Profit Jumps 63% to N744.5 Billion in Nine Months

First HoldCo Plc reported a 65.1 percent rise in net profit for the first nine months of 2026 compared to the same time last year. This information comes from their latest unaudited results released on Friday. The growth was driven by better performance across their income sources.

The financial services group saw gross earnings increase to N2.9 trillion, up from N2.7 trillion last year. This growth was mainly due to a stronger contribution from their commercial banking business.

The commercial banking division made up 94 percent of their total revenue and 87.4 percent of profit after tax.

However, net interest income, which is the money banks earn from loans minus what they pay to depositors, dropped by 16 percent to N1.3 trillion. The interest expense as a percentage of interest income went up to 39.8 percent from 34.5 percent last year. This shows that costs are rising for net interest income.

The banking group set aside N207.1 billion to cover bad loans, which is 28.3 percent lower than what they set aside for the same reason last year.

Net fees and commissions increased by 48.1 percent to N316.4 billion. This rise was due to better financial advisory fees and higher income from brokerage services.

Profit also benefited from a 19.9 percent increase in foreign exchange gains and a 26 percent rise in net gains from selling investment securities.

First HoldCo also made N104.6 billion in net gains from financial instruments at FVTPL. This is a big increase from the N72.8 billion loss they had last year.

Other operating income jumped to N142.1 billion, nearly six times what it was before.

Apart from boosted income, the good results were helped by cost-cutting measures. The banking group reduced personnel costs by 3.4 percent and other operating costs by 12.8 percent by spending less on advertising and promotions.

Profit before tax rose by 60.8 percent to N566.5 billion. Profit after tax also increased to N744.5 billion, up from N450.9 billion.

Total assets grew to N32.2 trillion from N27.3 trillion at the end of last year.

In July, First HoldCo’s board announced a plan to pay at least 60 percent of the group’s profit after tax as annual dividends. The financial institution believes this shows their confidence in their ability to earn money, strong capital position, improving asset quality, diverse revenue sources, and positive outlook for ongoing profit and growth.