GTCO Under Pressure to Show Profit Growth With Stock up 75% Year-to-Date

Guaranty Trust Holding Company (GTCO) stock price has raced to over N100 a share and now pressure is building for a stellar second quarter (Q2) earnings due any moment from now to justify the huge rally, after a 43% drop in Q1 profit.

GTCO is the top-performer among tier-one Nigerian lenders, with shares up 75.44% in 2025, as a recently completed secondary listing in London and sidestepping of regulatory loan forbearance issues helped to position it as best in class among peers.

However, GTCO recorded a 43% slide in Profit after Tax (PAT) in the First Quarter (Q1) of 2025 to N258 billion compared to N457 billion in Q1 2024, largely due to elevated unrealised Fair value gain on financial instruments of N331.55 billion in Q1,2024 that did not re-occur in 2025.

“The market will be watching to see how GTCO will maintain its momentum following its rapid rally,” said a stock trader speaking with MoneyCentral. “There could be a sell-off if profit falls again in Q2.”

Valuation wise, GTCO is not expensive on a historic basis but trades at a much higher level compared to peers.

The lender trades at 1.19 times book value, more than double fellow mega cap peers like United Bank for Africa (UBA) which trades at 0.47X book, Access Holdings at 0.42X book and FrstHoldCo at 0.49X book. Zenith Bank trades a little bit higher at 0.71 times book value.

Bank stocks in general have outperformed the market with the NGX Banking Index up 49.4% this year compared to a 39.98% gain in the NGX All Share Index.

GTCO is Nigeria’s largest listed bank by market capitalsation, valued at N3.64 trillion.

GTCO reported profit before tax of N300.4 billion for the three-month period ended March 31, 2025, more than the N257.2 billion combined pre-tax profit for Stanbic IBTC (N116.4 billion), Fidelity Bank (N105.8 billion) and FCMB Group (N35 billion).

In 2024, GTCO concluded an extensive clean-up on its risk portfolio, which significantly de-risked its balance sheet and led to it becoming the only Nigerian-owned bank without any forbearance loans as of CBN’s directive to end regulatory forbearance for Nigerian banks.

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