Aliko Dangote's refinery made $1.82 billion net profit in H1

Aliko Dangote's refinery generated $2.60 billion of earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation in the first half of 2026, almost five times the $545.3 million it managed across the whole of 2025.

Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals FZE reported revenue of $13.91 billion for the six months to June, gross profit of $2.50 billion and net income of $1.82 billion, according to figures in a research report by Renaissance Capital Africa.

The plant averaged 83.6 percent utilisation over the period. It began January at roughly 45 percent and reached full crude distillation unit utilisation during the second quarter, after improvements to its residual fluid catalytic cracker and a shift away from producing lower-value reduced crude oil.

The margin explains the rest. Gross refining margin, the difference between what a refinery pays for crude and what it earns selling the products, reached $24.50 a barrel in the first half against $13.70 in 2025 and $10.70 in 2024. It hit $33.70 a barrel in the first quarter before easing as global crack spreads normalised following the disruption caused by the Iran conflict.

Renaissance calculates that the half-year average implies a second-quarter margin near $18 a barrel, and forecasts $27.55 for the full year, which would require a recovery to between $29 and $30 in the second half.

The EBITDA margin for the period was 18.7 percent.

The figures arrive as the refinery prepares what Dangote has called a People's IPO. Nigeria's Securities and Exchange Commission approved a public offer price of 525 naira a share, and the minimum subscription is ten shares, or 5,250 naira.

Renaissance puts the post-listing equity value at between $57.11 billion and $65.44 billion, equivalent to 608.20 to 696.94 naira a share on an enlarged share count. The top of that range sits 32 percent above the approved offer price.

The bank's case rests on the plant's complexity, its scale, its operating costs and its ability to sell into either the Nigerian market or export markets depending on where returns are better at any given moment. It also depends on a second phase of construction that would take crude processing capacity to 1.4 million barrels a day, roughly double the current 650,000.

The refinery has become a substantial exporter this year. It shipped jet fuel to the United States for the first time, was the world's largest single exporter of jet fuel during April and May according to S&P Global Energy, and was Europe's largest supplier of jet fuel and diesel in August, according to Devakumar Edwin, a vice president at Dangote Industries.

Dangote is the wealthiest person in Africa. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index tracked his fortune at $34.8 billion in July, up $4.86 billion for the year, and the gain has come from the refinery rather than from the cement business that built it.