Adaeze Okafor

Naira corridor tightened 80bps this week to NGN 1,548/USD parallel vs NGN 1,510 official — a 2.5% spread, tightest since Q1. Remittance corridor economics repricing accordingly; re-run your take-rate models.

GTCO FY26: non-interest income now 47% of revenue, up from 31% three years ago. Pan-African fee book (NGN 412bn) growing 2.3x faster than the domestic book. This is what franchise diversification actually looks like.

Nigerian retail e-commerce basket size +18% YoY in NGN (flat in USD), frequency unchanged. Consumers absorbing inflation via bigger, less frequent baskets. The margin implication for FMCG distribution is under-modelled.

Zenith's digital income mix crossed 40% this half — first Nigerian tier-1 to do so. Every 5pts of digital mix historically compresses CIR ~180bps. The re-rating math is now mechanical.

OPay processes ~NGN 8trn/month across a 500k+ merchant footprint — roughly 2x the combined POS throughput of the top-3 banks. Branch networks are now a P&L drag masquerading as distribution.

CBN cash-in-circulation data: currency outside banks fell to 87% of total from 94% pre-cashless push. The behavioural transition happened faster than the policy narrative admits. Digital rails are the default now.

Access Holdings' pan-African subsidiaries contributed 31% of PBT this half vs 19% two years ago. The expansion thesis is finally earning its cost of capital — but only in three of the eight new markets.

Fidelity Bank's SME book grew 24% into a tightening cycle without impairment migration. Either the underwriting is genuinely differentiated or the vintage hasn't seasoned. Watch NPL formation in Q4.

Nigerian fintech M&A: 4 deals >$50m closed YTD vs 1 in all of 2025. The consolidation window opened when the funding window closed. Standard playbook, faster timeline.

Dangote refinery ramp is quietly the biggest FX story of the year — every 100kbpd of domestic petrol replacement saves ~$450m/quarter of import demand. The NGN implication is structural, not tactical.