Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the 2025 full year result presentation. My name is Salvador Anglada. I'm the Chief Executive Officer of Optasia. I have on my right Mariusz Dabrowski, the Chief Financial Officer. We're gonna both together go through the highlights of our our business and our results in 2025. Mariusz will cover the financial performance in detail, and then I will give you a strategic outlook of how we see 2026. Of course, we will open up after that the Q&A session, and you will have the opportunity to come with your questions after this brief presentation. Optasia, as everybody knows, the largest AI-powered fintech platform that enable financial access across the emerging markets. We are champion on financial inclusion.
We provide micro credit at scale. We have had a very important 2025 year, where we have IPO, as everybody knows, our business. Today, we are just providing the first set of results of our IPO story. We have had record growth and profitability on our numbers, $265 million revenue, up 76% growth and $58 million normalized IPO net income, which is close to 60% growth. All this coming with a strong cash flow conversion or generation. 39% of our EBITDA is being converted to cash flow. The driver of the growth is our microfinance services that today account for 63% of our revenue business at an impressive 149% growth.
We have continued expanding our footprint. We have added two new countries. We have had additional eight deployments as part of the footprint. Very important, we keep our discipline in risk management. Our default rate is at the level of 1.2%. Very important, we have met and achieved all our IPO ambitions, and we have even overdelivered on the numbers that we promised to the market. The growth was expected to be above 50%, and finally it has been 76%. The EBITDA growth at the level of 52%. Impressive also, the net income growth from more than 45% up to 57%. All this, of course, with managing properly the capital expenditure and keeping the CapEx below 5% in 2025.
We continue with our model B2B2X. As everybody knows, we use distribution partners to gain access to customer data, disburse and collect. We have in our network 50 partners and the financial institutions, which are the one that provide us with the lending on record on their books. Although we keep and we support the underwriting of any default on our loans. We provide, as everybody knows, two type of services, microfinance solutions and airtime credit. Both of them have grown significantly in 2025. Today, we have 63 deployments, and we have operations in 38 countries. These are countries, w e have added two new countries to our ecosystem in 2025, and we have added eight new deployments, three on MFS and three on airtime credit.
Very important on the MFS side, Cameroon and Congo, that will help us to continue boosting our revenue in 2026. The diversification of the revenues by country continues being well under control and diversified. We don't have any single country that contribute more than 20%. Maybe here to make a comment on the Middle East because of the conflict that is happening in Iran. Well, first of all, to say that all the people that are operating our deployments in those countries are safe. Second, that the deployments are running smoothly, although we have contingency plans.
Third, and more important, Middle East being important, of course, is the smallest of our eight regions and counts for only a single low digit in the revenue profile, which means that it's not affected, but it will not affect even if we need to reduce the activity in each of these deployments. We feel absolutely comfortable with that. Much more worried about our people and to be sure that they are safe. We have continued investing, of course, in our technology, in our platform, in our data models. We are automating a lot of activities, creating the scale and sophisticating the algorithm that we are producing.
We have been able to disburse more than $5.5 billion, which means $50 million of disbursement and distribution per day. We have been able to handle effectively more than 34 million transactions, loan transactions per day, just showing the robustness of our platform and our models. We continue investing in talent. We continue investing in our people. Half of our employees, or more or less half of our employees are tech people, tech on the platform side and on the algorithm side. We are also investing heavily on the front end on business marketing capabilities, and also to deploy our financial partners' ecosystem. We will continue investing across in order to be sure that we are sustaining the growth that is expected for 2026.
It is very important that we continue achieving the very important part of our business, which is our purpose to create and to enhance financial inclusion. We're proud to say that nearly 900 million people can access or have the ability to access our services. In 2025, more than 430 million people have used our services, both microfinance services and airtime credit solutions. With this introduction, I would like to hand over to the CFO, the Chief Financial Officer, Mariusz Dabrowski, to go deeper on the financial performance and the insights.
Thank you.
Carry on.
Thank you. I have the pleasure to present the results for 2025. As you can see, we have delivering the tremendous performance, continuing to deliver at scale. Serving our mission serving around the world to hundred to thousand, million of the customers in 2025. We do a tremendous growth of the revenue, reaching $265 million. The growth, which is outstanding, the 76%, the yearly growth. We did it also controlling the risk, as you can see, and it was also presented during our IPO roadshow. We keep the coverage ratio of the 4x , slightly more the 4x . At the same time, we're not only growing our top line, we're also going to deliver the profitability. It was always our aim.
As you can see, the EBITDA margin being the 43%, delivering $150 million of the EBITDA, and more importantly, normalized net profit growing 57%, reaching $58 million of the profit. We did it, of course, with the low capital intensity and, as was already mentioned by Salva, we make sure that the business is very well diversified and ready for the future. Of course, before going to the top line, it's quite important to understand the drivers of our business. Over the years, you can see the number of the service users is increasing, and the growth in 2025 is going to continue, kind of reaching 43%.
That, of course, drive the distribution. You can see distribution is growing in the same line, reaching 44%. What we are pleased to kind of announce is not only the growth of the MFS business, but also we can see the mature business of ACS delivering substantial benefit with double digits growth year over year. It drives, at the end of the day, the top line growth. As I mentioned before, the top line growth, 76%. This is driven, of course, the change of the mix. Our change of the mix increased from the 44% of MFS in 2024 to around the 62% in 2025. That is supporting by the higher take rate and better unit economics, as you can see, adjusted EBITDA.
The adjusted EBITDA as a percentage of the distribution value is growing. That is linked with the fact that our MFS business have a better unit economics. However, of course, the adjusted EBITDA margin due to, I would say, the accounting measures is decreasing to the 43%. Now, this is in line with our guidelines and, of course, the strong performance of total adjusted EBITDA, it's very visible on the screen. Going to the change of the mix, I think it's we were repeating this during our IPO, but it's always good to kind of put in front of you an understanding of the shift of the mix.
As you can see, the shift of the mix from 44% to 62%, driving, of course, the global distribution to the $5.5 billion of the distribution in 2025. It's changing two elements. One is, of course, increase of the take rate. You can see it growing 4% to 4.5%, and that is followed by the growth of the default. The default is slightly increasing from 0.9% to 1.2%, but this is in line with expectation, and this is simply driven by the fact of the change of the mix. As we discussed with you during our IPO, keeping the ratio of, k eeping the coverage ratio at 4 intact, and that enables us to kind of very healthy grow the business over the years, and it will continue in 2026.
Looking at the operational efficiency, of course, not surprising by this level of the increase of the business top line profitability and also in EBITDA. You can see that we're obtaining economies of scale. So operational cost is dropping year over year, and that will continue. At the same time, the CapEx, even though we are investing more notional amount for 2024, so you can see we invested $12 million for our IP and the development, but still is dropping.
In other words, the point I'm trying to say is that the business is a kind of the fixed cost and fixed nature, and we'll be kind of enjoying the economies of scale going forward as well. Just talking about the net working capital. As you remember during our IPO show, we were telling you about the change of the net working capital. We just, which is investment for us as we're growing the business. During this time, we were telling you that we are stabilizing the change of the net working capital as a percentage of revenue.
What I'm pleased to kind of report to you is that, according to our guidelines and in line with the expectation, you can see the decrease of the change of the net working capital from the first half of the year 2025 to the second half of the year. In other words, we kind of stabilize this ratio in the middle teens, and this is in line with what I was presenting to you during our roadshow in November at the IPO time. That also drives, if you look at the cash flow contribution, let's say, the contribution conversion. You can see that the contribution conversion in the second half of the year in 2025 crossed the 50%.
You can see it's higher than 2024. This is linked with, of course, the better usage of the Net Working Capital, and that should continue over the next period of time. Going back to the profit after tax. As you can see, due to the one-off cost, our profit after tax is increasing 19%. As we discussed it, there is two elements of the one-off in nature. One being, of course, the IPO related cost, and second of all is kind of the IPO management compensation. This is one-off in nature, and of course, kind of drives the total profitability.
Which is more important for the business and for the evaluation of the performance of the business is to normalize net income and normalize kind of net profit. As you can see, we normalize these numbers. Our baseline is increasing by 57%, reaching $57.8 million. This is tremendous performance. This is amazing performance. I believe, let's say, you can find a lot of assets with this type of the growth and the type of the business. Efficient capital structures and support this scale. As you can see, we're using the off-balance sheet nature. In other words, we're using the strengths of our partner in the partnership. As you can see, as we're increasing our contribution from MFS, the source of the funding is changing.
We can see the increase of the off-balance sheet, financial partner liquidity facility, and of course, the bank guarantee. Both of them is very effective, and both of them is kind of driving the growth of the business and in line with the growth of the business. This is the summary. Not going into the details. Probably what it worth mentioning, but, I'm very proud of the performance in 2025, especially the performance of the business in the first and second half of the year was quite strong. We not only delivered the growth and top line, we also delivered the profitability, both EBITDA and profit. We exceed the expectation of the market. We improved our kind of net working capital conversion, and we also improved the cash flow conversion.
All of this element is a tremendous achievement of the company. I will hand over to Salvador.
Thank you, Mariusz. As he said, outstanding performance, beating and exceeding the expectation of the market, very balanced in all the metrics of our operation, which is absolutely critical for us. Let me just give you a little bit of the outlook of 2026. We have already nearly three months over. You will see that we are gonna even upgrade our guidance as of this announcement today. That means we feel very comfortable with the performance of the business, even with the conflict of Iran. We really believe we're gonna exceed even the guidance that we provide as part of the IPO.
Of course, we believe the tailwinds will continue in the markets that we operate, either because of the increase of demographics in per capita of those economies, and definitely the establishment of the mobile money as a way of interacting in this part of the world. Also with favorable regulations regulating more and more digital lending that is very much in favor of what we're doing in a market that it's huge in terms of unbanked population, where the credit is being extended thanks to the technology and where the type of model that we just apply, the partnerships, I think is the right equation in order to continue scaling our growth. We have clarity in terms of our strategy. We know what we need to do.
We presented as part of our IPO, lot of growth coming from our core, our existing deployments. We foresee growth in each of the deployments because of penetration, but also because of the innovation. Definitely, we're gonna open up new deployments as we speak, and we will talk about that. The future paths for us are the new products and the new ecosystems. You will see the details in the next slide, and definitely continue betting in Asia as our next destination. We have seven priorities for the company that we presented as part of our kickoff and leadership meeting. Definitely the most important deliver on our promise. Always deliver. Always deliver on what we said.
We want to be closer to our customers, and that's why we change the organization, create a regional organization, and merge in the different line of business, one single front end for our customers. We are more and more industrializing on what we do, and this is important because we are gaining size, and that will help us to improve the speed and the replicability of what we're doing, and expanding our frontiers in terms of products and in terms of market. All, of course, keeping state-of-the-art of our algorithms, our platform, and our technology, and attracting and retaining the right people across the company and the different markets that we operate. Being more precise on what we're doing, as I said, I mean, we foresee a lot of growing existing accounts. We are also investing in business in marketing.
We are optimizing. We are sub-segmenting. We are more sophisticated, even in our discriminating on pricing depending on the population. There is a significant growth that we will achieve in the existing accounts. Although, of course, we continue expanding our next territory that we want to open hopefully this year, is the big market that we are not there yet in Africa. Kenya definitely will be the next one, but also we are very optimistic with Egypt and Ethiopia. We will expand with new partners, relationships, and M-PESA is coming to the door as part of our deployments this year. On the future side, we are very active on new propositions and new products.
In the first quarter, we're launching two new deployments on small and medium lending propositions that will also be, in my opinion, expanded to most of the territory that we are providing lending to retail. We are active on the new products telco BNPL providing telco service on installments or bill to a line of credit. Hopefully Mozambique will be the first deployment that we will launch this proposition and definitely also continue expanding in Asia. Expect to open MFS propositions and services in Malaysia and Philippines as part of the year with a very, very healthy pipeline in terms of number of deals, but also in terms of the potential of those deals in the market. Let me maybe fine-tune a bit or deep dive, sorry, in our partnership with FirstRand.
As everybody knows, they invested 20%. They got 20% of Optasia in parallel with the IPO. We've been working with them, trying to understand, I mean, the potential opportunity working together. I would say that there are significant opportunities, and we are working on them. Maybe just to nominate and name three of them, we are working on opening up and helping them in the markets that they have wallets to provide microfinance services, and that will be live during the year. We are also taking advantage of them becoming our lender on record and financing in the markets that we both are present, them as retailer and us as a microfinance operator.
We are working in future innovative proposition that could handle us to become state-of-the-art, especially in the countries where we both are operating. You will see the benefit of this partnership moving forward in the coming quarters. Also, very important, today we announced the acquisition, our first acquisition after IPO, the state-of-the-art platform providing prepaid or credit on the electricity, the utility markets. Finergi is a platform with a state-of-the-art technology, allowing us to provide credit to people that are prepaid, I mean, the utility usage, and this is being properly integrated at the meter level. As everybody knows, Africa and also Asia is predominantly a prepaid market on the utility side.
Only in Africa, we estimate that the lending market on the prepaid utility side is close to $10 billion and will continue growing and doubling this amount in the coming 10 years. It's a fantastic market, full prepaid in most of the cases, and the idea is to provide electricity the same that we do with a telecom service. We provide the voucher in advance, and we recover with the ability to recover at the prepaid, at the meter site and secure the pay back. It's a new vertical. It's very much in line with our strategy to open up new line of businesses.
It was something that was clear on our side, and we have been able to complete the transaction in this first quarter of the year, and we will launch the operations moving forward. We foresee impressive growth in this part of the business, but also we foresee important synergies with our business on the data side, on the platform side, and also on the commercial side. All this business, of course, is out of our guidance, and that will enrich and expand the potential opportunity of Optasia growing and providing financial inclusion in different parts of the market. Maybe to finalize and to reiterate that, we wanted to update and upgrade our guidance for 2026. We provide some indications as part of the IPO.
Today, we are confident that we can beat those numbers. The revenue growth, we expect to be above 30% year-over-year. In the case of our EBITDA, our operating profit also, we expect to grow above 30%, we are keeping our net income growth at the level or above 40% and our capital expenditure in the level of 6% of our revenues. With this, I believe, it's time just to open up the space for the questions of the different people that are part of this call. Thank you.
Thanks very much, Salvador and Mariusz. We will just start with the questions that have been submitted by members who have joined the call. The first question is from Nadim Mohamed at Standard Bank. He's asked: Please, could you share any updates to the pipeline for new market opportunities? Which are the key markets to focus on over the next year, and is there any update on the M-PESA opportunity?
As we said, we have a very rich pipeline. As of today, it was being included in one of the slides. We're talking about more than 160 deals live. That means more than $200 million of annual revenue on those deals. This is first. Second, yes, I mean, the activity is massive at this stage. We believe we can double the number of sites that we achieved in 2025 across the different geographies. In the case of Africa, it's of course in our existing deployments open up with new partners and new services. Specifically, as I have just mentioned, we are putting emphasis in new geographies that we don't have even presence.
I was talking about Kenya, and I will talk about M-PESA in a second. Kenya is our next destination. It will happen in 2026, as we already mentioned as part of the IPO. We are positive in Egypt, exactly the same. We have started to have opportunities in Ethiopia, which is also a very big market. On top of that, we're talking about South Africa. We talk about Mozambique. We're talking about a lot of the West countries or sorry, French-speaking West Africa countries. Yes, I mean, I could say, I mean, we are gonna provide more detail on that because it will happen at the time that the deployments are being fulfilled. The activity is massive.
If I talk about Asia, I also mentioned that we expect at least two MFS deployments in 2026, mainly in Malaysia and Philippines. The activity continues, and the opportunities are maturing, and we expect a great 2026 in terms of deployments. Maybe mentioning on M-PESA, as we already mentioned before, the deployments continue as we speak, and we are very positive to deploy with them in two countries in 2026, mainly in Kenya and Mozambique. Those are the first two countries. Yes, we believe it's gonna happen mid or end of first half of the year or beginning of the second half of the year, depending on the regulatory approval.
We are exactly on the same page as we were only three months ago, and we expect to announce that as soon as the deployments are live.
Thanks very much, Salva. The second question is from Ilan Stermer at Anchor. The question is: FirstRand holds a 20% stake in Optasia and has stated that it believes it can use your IP in its own business. How do you ensure that other minority interests in Optasia are protected from such strategic investors? What protections have been put in place to address this?
Well, I think, I mean, the whole collaboration is fully arm's length. It's based on the opportunities in the market. What we are doing with them is just because of this strategic partnership is to find out where we can create value and where we can enhance collaboration. I was mentioning that, I mean, for them, as being their engine of providing micro loans in the market that they are operating with their wallets is a big win. It's absolutely a great opportunity for both. For us, because we will have new deployments, also because we are entering in a new ecosystem, which is the digital banking of the banking.
For them, because, I mean, that will create value proposition in their own market, but it's absolutely market-driven. There is nothing to prejudice the rest of the shareholders because then the other way around, I mean, what we're gonna do by this is creating additional value. On the other side, I mean, having them providing as a lender on record in some of the operations, it's also arm's length. It's not exclusive at all, but it's an additional entity, financial institution that allowed us, because as everybody knows, we diversify always the sources of financing. It's great news, and the IP that it has been mentioned is not to use our IP, it's to use our services.
Thanks very much. The third question is from David Eborall at SaltLight. He has asked: Could you please help us understand the bridge from EBITDA to free cash flow? Our understanding is that the working capital goes up because of the escrow account effect with your partners. How long before a successfully repaid loan from a customer ends up in the free cash flow? And can you guide us to how new growth will translate to future free cash flow margins?
Thank you so much. I think it's like we discussed about this during the IPO. I think of course because of the change on the ACS to MFS, we have a kind of a different way of the invoicing because, you know, let's say our way to the cash increasing from the three months, if you don't know the ACS, to the five months. Of course, because of the change of the mix, we experiencing the increase of so-called the metrics KPI, which was used and also presented now in our financial statement, defined as a change of the net working capital as a percentage of the revenue. Of course, the change of the net working capital in percent of the revenue is a key parameters of the cash conversion.
First of all, we do the change within the working capital. As you can see, we already proved that, let's say, these parameters that I was discussing this during our IPO process, we're stabilizing the middle teens. We already proven that, let's say, these parameters already stabilized, actually improved of the first half versus of the second half, and that it will continue. In our guidance, we're also telling to the readers is that as we stabilize the growth, these parameters should kind of go to the kind of the high single digits, and we know the way to deliver this over the next kind of two years' time. At the same time we even look at the kind of cash conversion. The cash conversion is quite stable.
It's more about link of the growth, and we are in the range of the 40% of the cash conversion of the EBITDA, and that it will sustain. In other words, as we are kind of expanding, the moment we reach the maturity, of course can expect these parameters go up. As we speak right now, for the kind of foreseeable futures, I'm expecting this parameter to stay at a level around 40%.
Thank you.
Maybe just to add that, it was in the presentation you see as Mariusz referred, the difference between the first quarter, the first half of the year and the second half of the year, and we referred to that as part of our IPO, and I think it's a very interesting data, how it has evolved in line with our expectation.
Thank you. The next question is from James Starke at Morgan Stanley. He would like to congratulate you on your maiden results, and his first question is: There is an impressive growth in MFS users up to 105 million. Can you give some color where you gained users in the period and where your outlook for MFS users sits?
I mean, we do not disclose much more information about the users, but I mean, of course, I mean, as much as we are expanding the service, I mean, as much as we are growing our base. I mean, we have expanded significantly the service in Pakistan, which is a great market. That means that more users coming to the equation. Ghana and Uganda, exactly the same, but also in places like Congo, the DRC. It's another area that we have expanded. You see we never provide this information before. That's why it's a surprise, but it's very much in line with the fantastic growth that we have had during the year in the MFS service.
As much as we're gonna open up new deployments, as much as we're gonna see this growth going up. It's very interesting to see how much the distribution has also evolved during the year. It's much more closer now to ACS. I can foresee that will be close to ACS or even higher during 2026. Exactly the same in terms of users. You can expect high increase on the MFS customer base as we grow our business there.
Great. Thank you. James' second question is, please can you expand on the outlook for normalized OpEx growth from here?
Well, the normalized OpEx, as you can kind of see over the year, it was affected by the IPO year. Going forward, you should expect the increase of, on economic of scale, which you already kind of see looking at the results of 2025. Going forward, you should expect these parameters, in other words, OpEx percentage of the revenue further going down. Why? Because let's say our cost is a fixed measure, and as Salvador mentioned, we're using a lot of kind of the AI in our processes within the different functions. That will bring the benefit for the business.
Thank you. James' third question is, can you expand on how sensitive your business is, particularly disbursement volumes and asset quality, to inflation and fuel price shocks?
Well, I mean, it's early days. Definitely we always say that, I mean, our business is not so much linked to the macro. It's much more to the micro, and this is what we have seen in the past. I would say that the only thing that I can foresee if the conflict continues, and it is true that inflation pops up, I mean, could be the medium term and the valuation of the currencies that, I mean, today are quite stable. It's something to look at. We are not worried about the impact disbursements because, as I said, there is no correlation or not big correlation. We will need to observe the inflation more from an FX perspective than any other thing.
Thank you. Got a question from Tumi Loate at 36ONE . MFS loans are becoming a larger contributor to the revenue mix. Given the IFRS 9 requirement to recognize expected credit losses at origination, are you seeing any initial credit strain from upfront provisioning as the portfolio grows?
Well, first of all, let's say we always follow, let's say, the IFRS 9 and, let's say, this guideline. Presenting the issue at disbursement was always our policy, it's not obviously a change for us. Change in the nature of the MFS is probably, maybe so. It's important to state that we are controlling the risk, we are defining the risk. As you can see the strong performance of the business and the fact that our default is only growing from 1 % to 2%. You have to look at the context. At the same time, if you look, let's say the growth of the take rates. In other words, our revenue as a percent of disbursement growth from 4% to 4.8%. It's simply change of the mix.
The risk as it is, as we state, if you look at the country basis, it's stable. Yeah? We are controlling the risk, so that will not change. The recognition is always upfront, and we always upfront. The increase of the business will not change the trajectory of the default.
Thank you. Got a question from Bheki Mthethwa at Bateleur Capital . Can you chat about the potential working capital efficiencies or benefit that could be achieved with the FNB relationship in terms of funding structures?
Well, I think it's, as Salva mentioned, there is a lot of opportunity in front of us. One of them, all of these opportunities is discussed on the arm's length basis. It was of course with discussing with FNB how we can build the usage, this partnership. Of course, that will create some efficiency coming from the efficiency of the cost of the financing, the first solution link with the hedges. It's worth to state that the FNB is not only the bank we're operating. We have other multiple banks we're operating, and that's always the case. It's more like adding one partner with the strengths to use it and of course gaining the efficiency. Nothing else.
Thank you. We've also had a question from Warren Riley, also Bateleur. Could you provide more color on the deal you have signed with M-PESA?
Well, I think as we already mentioned, we have a deal signed at group level, and now we are working at country level, which is what is important for us. It's a normal deal that will allow us to deploy it in the different countries that have the same way that we do with MTN or with Orange. The first country that it will be live, in my opinion, is gonna be Kenya. We are pretty well advanced there, and I hope that it will be by mid of the year, allowing us to launch a micro extra cash or cash loan service with them. The second one is gonna be Mozambique. We are gonna launch for the first time ever a virtual line of credits over there.
I mean, using the M-PESA platform, and the expectation will be more closer to the second half of the year for sure because I mean the regulatory approvals are a little bit slower there. Third country where M-PESA is quite active I believe we can deal and partner with them is Ethiopia, but it's still early days. I would say that the first two countries are the one that I have mentioned, and I believe that both of them will be live in 2026. I want to remind that will be two out of all the deployment that we are gonna do across Africa and East Asia.
As I said, we will have a big ambition this year to try to maybe double the number of deployments that will be live during 2026.
Thanks very much, Salva. Got a question from Maruf Sheikh at Rand Merchant Bank. As the business scales, how should lenders think about the appropriate level of guarantees relative to equity and cash? And have there been any updates to internal thresholds to ensure the model remains capital adequate?
Well, it's like if you think about it, on the capital adequacy ratio, you have to come to understand that we strengthen our capital and balance structure. During the IPO, kind of the raise of primary, and of course, primary can't increase our current capital strength as we speak right now. This is probably one. Second point is that the bank guarantee increase will come to follow the increase of the business. We keep kind of always the ratio for the bank guarantee provided to the business at the same level. Initially, the bank guarantee is normally higher, then later on when it come to progress and the bank guarantees, it's getting kind of lower and lower. That's probably two elements to understand.
What is important to get it, the structures we're creating in the bank guarantee is very cost-effective. We think about the cost of the bank guarantee is at least three to four times lower than any cost of the funding. It's gonna be getting the efficiency. It's normal type of business, very effective, and we are have a strong capital, so no worry.
Thank you. Second question from Maruf is: Will the acquisition of Finergi be funded through a combination of equity or debt or both? Furthermore, do you see the leverage levels being more levered over time, or do you intend to keep it in line at current levels?
For the first question, we're not gonna use debt to finance that. We have cash, and it's a combination of cash and shares. This is how we're gonna finance the Finergi acquisition. For the second one, which is the leverage level, I believe this is what the question, the second one.
Yes.
The second question was about the leverage. Is it going to be in line with current levels?
Well, it's like, look at the leverage. We have to keep the leverage below 1. We look at what is our leverage currently. It's also kind of at the very low level. Of course, we're talking about a very small acquisition. This transaction would not really influence our leverage.
Thank you. Third question from Maruf is: Can you provide some light on the default provision doubling from full year 2024 to full year 2025? Assume this is largely due to the MFS business.
Well, I think it's what I discussed before. I think this is, i f you think about the portfolio effect, the country effect. If you look at the country effect, our default is very stable. We do it in the very methodical ways. In other words, we have it around the babysitting period when we launch the project. We grow the business when we cannot be comfortable with the default, and we control default. We define default. The reason why you kind of have increase of the default, it cannot be seen in the isolation of the increase of other parameters. What I mean the other parameters is the take rate. If you look at the increase of the take rate, and I give this example, and I can repeat it this example one more time.
You can see the take rate is growing from the 4% in 2024 to the 4.8% in 2025. Of course, if you change the portfolio mix, you should expect the default rate growing. We always say what is important is the relationship, and the relationship is very healthy. Our take rate is 4 x more than before. We call it coverage ratio. 4x more, so in other words, default rate has to increase 4x before we can break even.
Thank you. The next question is from Zintle Twala at Mazi. Please could you explain the timing of the Finergi deal? Were the proceeds from the IPO for this acquisition and can we-
Sorry, what question?
Please could you explain the timing of the Finergi deal? Explain the timing. Were the proceeds from the IPO for this acquisition, and can we expect more?
More acquisitions. At the time that happened, well, I mean, Finergi just happened after the IPO. It was definitely part of our strategy to build up a new verticals, and we have been able to execute that once we conclude the IPO. We believe that it's a market that it could evolve and grow very significantly. We have a unique position, a very unique patent, the one that we have acquired, and we are able to intercept the credit at the mid-term level, which is unique. I think the opportunity is fantastic across the different markets that we have already operations and services with our other line of products. If we expect more acquisitions, definitely always we said that we'll be selective.
Always we said that need to be value accretive. Always we said that need to complement what we are doing. The answer is yes, if all these ticks happen. We are not eager to do acquisition because of acquisition. We are very selective, and we're gonna choose the right one that complements either our geographies or our product lines.
Thank you. A second question from Zintle is: Could you reiterate your shareholder remuneration framework and when you expect to start paying dividends?
As it was discussed during the IPO process, we were presenting to the investors that the first dividend payment will come to happen after the closing of 2026, and will be paid in 2027. As we speak currently right now, we're keeping this guidance. It doesn't change.
Thank you very much. Another question from Tumi at 36ONE is: On the Finergi transaction, given the links between the business and members of the broader shareholder or executive ecosystem, could you elaborate on the acquisition process? Specifically, were alternative targets considered that were not related to management, and could you walk us through-
Sorry, repeat the second one.
Specifically, were alternative targets considered that were not related to management, and could you walk us through how the board, supported by BDO's arm's-length review, ensured that the transaction was conducted on a fully independent and fair basis?
I think we follow absolutely King IV recommendations related to third-party transaction. This is a small third-party transaction. We cover the market this specific platform, and it's a very unique platform, unique IP. It's not easy to find out. We're looking at something that it has a significant competitive advantage. We believe that it's the right time to do the acquisition because we want to get the benefit of the growth of the market from a sectoral perspective, a governance perspective. As I said, I mean, everything was of course arm's length. We have, I mean, the independent directors assessing the whole process.
We do not need a third-party assessment, but we ask for it in terms of the process and the valuation. I would say the full transparency in the way that we have run and analyze and approve the transaction coming, of course, from the independent directors.
Thank you. Similar question from David Eborall at SaltLight. On Finergi, could you talk about your decision to buy versus build this functionality given your depth of distribution already?
Yeah, that's a really good question. That of course is always a potential alternative, the build instead of buy. The reality is that by buying this at this specific stage, it will allow to run very fast on the deployments. Today, Finergi is a reality. They have the ecosystem being built. We have a fantastic pipeline. We have a proof of concepts and pilots in four different countries. We have the technology and the proprietary of the IP. For us, if we try to build that, it will take much more time. We will lose the opportunity of the timing, the time to revenue at this stage.
To be honest, the last and most important thing for me is that we need to be sure that we have the bandwidth to do all what we're doing. Remember, we are growing in our markets. We are opening new geographies. We are launching new products. We are building up in Asia. For me, I mean, doing this acquisition at this level will allow to start running from now on to build up an operating model and allow, I mean, to grow this business as an independent line of business and gradually to apply the synergies that we are looking at. It was being evaluated, but definitely the value creation that we're gonna have with this acquisition is gonna be by far much higher than whatever we can do trying to build up our interbank.
Thank you. We have a question from Wessel Joubert at OysterCatcher. Can you please expand on the data monetization in Nigeria that was mentioned on one of the slides in the presentation?
Well, this is, as you remember, I mean, this is a small part of our business. We continue trying to see how we can use the data that we handle in our platform. The whole idea here is to try to offer a mobile service that take into account the intelligence that we have. It's a CVM type of approach. We are able to intercept someone out of credit and provide that with this type of service. I mean, we launched initially in Nigeria. We are in a babysitting period. We are looking at a second market most probably in 2026. Based on that, we will see how much we can expand the service.
It's a third line of business that we always talk about, the idea of using some of the data to provide additional services to in partnership with the telco. This is exactly what it is.
Thank you. The next question from Siphelele Mdudu at Matrix is: Are there any new products that FNB has launched with you since you started working together?
No, we have not launched anything yet. As I said, I mean, the first set of services will be us providing them on the geographies that they have awarded the possibility to provide cash advances or micro finance. That is the idea that we have, and I hope that we will see some of these markets live during 2026.
Great. Thank you very much. We have a question from Omri Thomas at Abax. You've entered into prepaid electricity. Are you considering other prepaid markets like water?
Like water, yeah. Yeah, when we say electricity, we talk about electricity, water and gas. I mean, it's the utility. Well, it is true that we are focused more on electricity because it's 70% of the total meter base. That don't mean that we will exclude in the future water or even gas. I mean, now, in terms of execution, in terms of what we're doing, I mean, we are very, very focused because it's the largest market.
Thank you. Another question from Omri is on MFS, have you introduced larger size loans? Is it in specific countries, and what is the maximum size of these loans?
We don't have a limit today. Yes, we are increasing the sizes. Yes, in some markets this year, you will see that in Pakistan. You will see that also in our case in Uganda. The answer is no, we have not reached the limit at all. As much as we are growing, as much as we are expanding our customer base, as much as we feel comfortable with it, we expand. I mean, just to be complete, this year you will see the increase in Pakistan and in Uganda.
Thank you. Is the loan quality experience the same on the higher value loans?
In terms of default? Do you want to answer the question?
Yeah, I think it's like you have to probably understand that. I think we were trying to explain during our IPO process. The way, the people who are getting the higher loan is normally the high quality people. So in other words, the same who was longer. Normally you should expect it, let's say the people who are taking with us kind of the third, fifth or kind of sixth loans have by definition the lower default rate. I would even argue the increase of the ticket size should kind of contribute to lower default in the future.
Yeah, it's more about selection of the customer base. That sub-segmentation is what we're doing. We are very sophisticated. It's not one single segment in a country but different sub-segments. For this type of loans that we're talking about, subsegment that normally have a lower default than even the lower part of the pyramid.
Thank you. We have another question from Nadim at Standard Bank. MFS take rates appear to have declined by approximately 1 percentage point between H1 and H2. Could you please explain how we should think about MFS take rates going forward?
Well, as we discussed before during the IPO process, it's like we talk about the portfolio blend, yeah? You can have a change of the portfolio blend. You can have experience in from kind of the point of time some deviation of the take rate. But in general, you should expect a kind of a take rate, kind of the to increasing slowly over a period of time, longer period of time. You shouldn't expect decrease of the take rate. It's simply the change of the mix of the portfolio, nothing else.
I mean, there are two elements. The portfolio have the issues, and MFS overall and inside MFS, which is what Mariusz referred, depends on the countries. The take rate will evolve in MFS, I mean, depending on the take rate of the different countries. Yeah, you can expect some fluctuation, but I think the overall trend, as he mentioned, in the future will be always going up.
Thank you. Question from Rorisang at Rothschild. Are you looking at additional acquisition targets following the Finergi acquisition to complement your service offering?
As I mentioned before, we are always looking for potential platforms or a company that could complement what we are doing. This is an active practice so far. There is nothing in the pipeline to come immediately, but it's an active situation. If we are able to find a platform that allows us to open up vertical like in the case of Finergi, and there are synergies with our operation, we will look at it. If we are able to find a company that allows us to increase our penetration in Asia, for instance, by doing the acquisition, we're gonna look at this plan. Okay. We always say that it's about selective acquisitions, and this is what we're gonna do. I mean, if there are value accretive and can create value for the future, we will look at it.
Thank you. We have a question from Craig Metherell at Denker Capital. Can you please provide any further detail around the earn-out targets as part of the Finergi deal and an outlook on the business reaching profitability?
We're not gonna provide details on the earn-out, but it's definitely based on our business plan, which is aggressive. We will welcome this payment if it's been achieved because it's really aggressive business plan, and we will not provide any intel. In terms of the business itself, what you can expect is a contribution of our top line into 2027. I would say more contribution on the profitability 2028, and definitely cash conversion the end 2028, 2029. I think those are the normal. This is the outlook that we have because at the beginning, as you can imagine, we are prioritizing the growth over any other thing.
Thank you. We have another question from David at SaltLight, which is: Is there any update on new partners such as Safaricom?
We will not normally I mean, until the contracts are not properly signed, we don't want to open up, but the answer is yes. I would say we have active discussions with absolutely, I would say, 95% of the big operators in Africa. Of course, I mean, we have operations with MTN or Airtel. You mentioned Safaricom and Vodacom. We have operations with Vodacom. And there are others that are happening. I am not gonna mention them. I would say, y ou can expect the new names coming to the deployment list in 2026 from groups that we do not provide service as of today.
Thank you. Got another question from Omri at Abax: Where do you expect the take rate and default rate to stabilize given the change in business mix?
Well, it's like a you have to think about this question in the context. We're already having, let's say, more than 60% of the business around them, in fact. You shouldn't expect so dramatic increase of the take rate in forward period of time. In the beginning of the, I would say small increase trajectory going up. Where it's currently going, I think it's difficult to kind of to say at the moment. I would say trend is upwards. We'll probably, in some future time, we can probably cross the 5%, even go further. It depends on the mix.
I mean, the default rates.
Default rates will follow the increase of the take rate. Simply, as you remember, and we're always talking about, we're keeping the so-called coverage ratio. This is the golden rule of the 4x coverage ratio. If your take rate is increasing, of course, it will come to increase.
Thank you very much. I think that's everything that we've got time for today. Thank you everybody for joining the call. If you have any further questions, please submit them to ir@optasia.com. Many thanks.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.