Zest, the fintech subsidiary of Nigeria’s Stanbic IBTC Holdings, grew its income fourteenfold to ₦874 million ($587,128) in the first half of 2025 from ₦61 million ($40,978) in the previous year, but rising staff and operating costs ensured that it remained in the red, according to Stanbic’s six-month financial statements.
Zest’s loss after tax fell to ₦389 million ($261,319), down 58.84% from the ₦945 million ($634,824) it posted in H1 2024, but its expenses climbed almost 24.95% to ₦1.26 billion ($846,432), keeping profitability out of reach.
Launched in October 2023, Zest is part of a wave of bank-owned fintechs—like Access’s Hydrogen and GTCO’s HabariPay—that emerged after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s 2010 directive required commercial banks to restructure into holding companies to offer non-banking services like payments.
The regulation gave banks room to set up licenced fintech subsidiaries and compete directly with independent players like Flutterwave, Paystack, Opay, and Moniepoint.
“We aspire to become the leading end-to-end financial services provider for businesses and individuals in our country and region,” Basil Omiyi, the Group Chairman of Stanbic Holdings, said during the launch of Zest.
Hydrogen and HabariPay have found their feet. Hydrogen’s after-tax profit hit ₦283 million ($190,111) in Q1, 2025, and HabariPay’s profit at ₦4.02 billion ($2.70 million) in H1, 2025, while Zest continues to struggle since declaring ₦1.21 billion ($812,844) as its loss after tax in 2023.
In January, Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc disclosed it was injecting ₦4 billion ($2.69 million) in Zest to help the struggling fintech scale its infrastructure and payment network. By June 2025, the bank’s total investment in its fintech subsidiary was ₦4.33 billion ($2.91 million), an 85.76% increase from the ₦2.33 billion ($1.57 million) recorded in December 2024.
Beyond enabling transfers, Zest is currently pitching itself as a payments partner for businesses, offering a single dashboard that integrates cards, bank transfers, mobile money, and QR codes.
Note: exchange rate used: ₦1,488.6/$
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