A surge in electronic transactions by Nigerians has helped the Federal Government to beat its revenue target by N88.73 billion by half-year 2025.
This is according to data contained in the Federal Government’s 2025–2027 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF), just released by the Budget Office.
The EMTL performance helped boost the government’s non-oil revenue for the period and cushioned the effect of a weak oil revenue.
What the data is saying
Based on the N230 billion full-year revenue projection from the EMTL, the half-year revenue expected to be at N134.17 billion surged to N222.90 billion, representing a 66.1% outperformance.
- Non-oil revenue performance was mixed. While Corporate Income Tax (CIT) collections of N5.86 trillion marginally exceeded the prorated projection of N5.44 trillion, a 7.6% overperformance, other segments struggled to meet expectations.
- Value-Added Tax (VAT) performed more robustly, with receipts of N4.82 trillion, surpassing the half year target by N439.22 billion, or 10%.
Despite these bright spots, net non-oil revenue, including receipts from solid minerals, totalled N12.14 trillion by June 2025, marking a shortfall of N1.81 trillion (13 percent) against projections.
The underperformance signals persistent weaknesses in tax collection and economic activity outside the oil sector.
Oil revenue performance
Gross oil and gas revenue for 2025 was projected at N51.04 trillion. However, by July 2025, only N11.17 trillion had been realised against a prorated target of N29.78 trillion, representing a performance rate of just 37.5 percent.
Weak crude production, price volatility, and limited refining margins continued to drag on receipts from Nigeria’s oil sector.
After statutory deductions, including the 13% derivation for oil-producing states and other first-line charges, net inflows to the Federation Account stood at N9.61 trillion, N15.78 trillion (62.2 percent) below the half year target.
This shortfall has intensified pressure on non-oil revenue streams to fill the gap.
What you should know
The 66.1 percent outperformance of the EMTL line reflects the deepening penetration of digital financial services across the economy, with more Nigerians using mobile money, bank transfers, and other electronic payment channels.
This reflected in the electronic transactions released by the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) which shows Nigerians spent N284.9 trillion electronically in the first quarter of 2025.
The value recorded on the NIBSS Instant Payment (NIP) represents a 22% increase over the N234.4 trillion transactions recorded in Q1 2024.
The NIP is an account-number-based, online real-time Inter-Bank payment solution developed in the year 2011 by NIBSS and it facilitates transactions across multiple electronic channels, including internet banking, mobile apps, Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), POS, ATM, among others.
