GTCO made ₦879.90bn before tax in the 9 months to September, down 2.3% from ₦900.80bn a year earlier. After tax, the drop is much steeper: profit fell 12.2% to ₦614.6bn from ₦699.6bn.
The gap between those 2 numbers is the story. Tax and other charges took about 30.2% of pre-tax profit this year, against 22.3% in 2025 (STATART calculations). On almost the same operating result, shareholders kept ₦85bn less.
The bank is still growing
Customers trust it with more money. Deposits rose 15.6% to ₦13.7trn, and total assets reached ₦18.37trn, up 3.46% since December. Gross earnings edged up 3.5% to ₦1.7trn.
Lending got cheaper to run, too. Loan impairment charges fell to ₦29.02bn from ₦69.79bn, a 58.4% drop (STATART calculation).
What slipped is the margin. Net interest margin narrowed to 9.8% from 11.4%, so each naira of assets earns less than it did. Earnings per share fell 19.9% to ₦16.58, faster than profit, which means this year's profit is spread across more shares.
The side businesses are gaining weight
GTCO's non-bank companies are small but moving fast. Together they made ₦23.88bn before tax, up about 70% from ₦14.08bn. That's 2.7% of group pre-tax profit, up from 1.6%.
2 units did the work. GT Fund Managers lifted pre-tax profit 82% to ₦11.24bn, and HabariPay, the payments arm, grew 72% to ₦11.23bn. The pension administrator barely moved, at ₦1.41bn.
At this pace, the non-bank units are a long way from changing the group's numbers. They'd need to grow about 3.7x to reach 10% of today's pre-tax profit (STATART calculation).
GTCO's core bank is in decent shape and its fund manager and payments arm are the fastest-growing parts of the group, but the higher tax bite cost shareholders far more than the subsidiaries added. Q4 margins will show whether the 9.8% is a floor or a slide.
Figures are as reported at the time of writing. STATART news is written by Frank Brother (Markets), Christina Amgbari (Insights) and Ebipadei Joseph (Lifestyle), and checked before publication.