Access Holdings Plc has published half-year (H1) accounts without an independent audit or statements from its auditor for the first time since at least 2015.
The figures came out 125 days after the half-year period ended, following a delay while the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) reviewed banks’ loan books and provisions.
The last time Access Bank (Access Holdings) didn’t issue an audited financial report for its Half-Year period was back in 2015, some eleven (11) years ago, according to data compiled by MoneyCentral.
The statements for the six months to June 30 are described as “unaudited” throughout.
They contain no independent auditor’s report, according to the  interim financial statements filed with the Nigerian Exchange (NGX).
The Group chief executive officer Innocent C. Ike and chief financial officer (CFO) Emeka Anthony Ogbechie, certified them on Page 35 of the accounts, under Section 405 of the Companies and Allied Matters Act.
Their statement said they had “reviewed the unaudited financial statements of the Group for the period ended 30 June 2026.”
MoneyCentral confirmed Access Bank and Access Holdings audited Half-Year financials, for every year dating back to 2015. KPMG handled the audited Half-Year accounts for 2023, 2024 and 2025, while PricewaterhouseCoopers, also known as PwC handled Half-Year audits for years 2016 – 2022.
Curious Contradiction in the Filing
Curiously the corporate governance report included in the filing says the audit fee “paid by the Company to KPMG for the 2026 half year statutory audit was N50,000,000.”
However, no audit opinion was included in the Access Holdings Half-Year (H1) financials filed on the NGX. The directors’ report says the board “approved the interim and full year unaudited financial statements.”
The filing does not explain why an audit that was paid for is not reflected in the published accounts.
What the Numbers Show
Access Holdings Profit after tax rose 23.5% to N266.72 billion in the half year period, and pretax profit increased 29.2% to N414.13 billion. Lower loan-loss charges did most of the work however as net impairment charges fell 70% to N69.01 billion from N230.07 billion.
Net fee and commission income rose 51.1% to N359.14 billion. Net interest income grew only 1.5% to N999.59 billion.
A new N148.36 billion net loss on a fair-value hedge and a N37.56 billion net foreign-exchange loss together reduced the result by N185.92 billion. A year earlier, the group had an FX gain of N45.94 billion. Earnings per share rose 20.4% to 448 kobo.
A Weak Second Quarter
The quarterly figures are less impressive. Access reported first-quarter profit after tax of N216.54 billion and pretax profit of N272.21 billion. Based on those figures, second-quarter pretax profit was about N141.92 billion and profit after tax about N50.18 billion, according to MoneyCentral calculations.
The impairment figures are also hard to reconcile. Q1 impairments were N73.81 billion, but the first-half total is only N69.01 billion. That implies a net write-back of about N4.8 billion in the second quarter, during the same period the CBN was reviewing provisions. The statements do not say whether the Q1 figures were restated.
The third quarter was stronger however as Q3 pretax profit was N253.23 billion, up 78.4% from the second quarter. Nine-month profit after tax rose 5.9% to N474.17 billion.
Asset Quality Under the Microscope
The credit-quality figures show the issues the CBN has been looking at across banks. Stage 3 loans to customers, those considered credit-impaired, rose to N521.73 billion at June 30 from N416.32 billion at the end of 2025. That is 3.60% of gross customer loans, up from 3.04%. Stage 2 loans, which show a significant rise in credit risk, rose to N708.11 billion from N620.58 billion.
Provision coverage fell even as impaired loans grew.
Loss allowances covered 43.5% of Stage 3 customer loans, down from 51.4% in December. In other words, impaired loans grew by about 25%, but the provisions set aside for them barely rose.
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