Kaspi.kz (KSPI) Q3 2026 earnings review
Kaspi.kz cuts its shopping volume target, but deposit rates fall
Kaspi.kz, the Kazakh shopping, payments and banking super-app, earned wider merchant fee margins while a stronger local currency depressed merchandise prices. Constant-currency revenue rose 18% to KZT 1.1 trillion, but profit before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, excluding one-offs, edged up just 1% because of high deposit interest payouts. Chief executive Mikheil Lomtadze cut the full-year Marketplace merchandise value growth outlook from 20% to 12%, which by our math leaves fourth-quarter growth near 8%.
| Revenue (constant currency) | KZT 1.1T +18% from a year ago |
|---|---|
| Adjusted EBITDA | KZT 408B +1% from a year ago |
| Marketplace GMV (constant currency) | KZT 2.2T +8% from a year ago |
| FY26 Marketplace GMV outlook | Cut to ~12% from ~20% previously |
⚖️ Verdict: ⚪ Neutral
The story is unchanged because lower deposit funding costs offset the sharp slowdown in shopping merchandise value. Two 1-percentage-point cuts to three-month savings rates in August and October allowed the company to keep its full-year 5% operating profit growth outlook, while advertising fees and the new Kasper AI assistant lifted Marketplace revenue 20% in constant currency. The bad news: Marketplace merchandise value grew only 8% even against last year's smartphone shortage, as average item prices in Kazakhstan fell 8%.
The question now is whether rising advertising fees and lower deposit rates can drive a 2027 profit rebound if lower import prices keep holding back merchandise value. One view is that 27% growth in purchases per shopper and two deposit rate cuts build a strong 2027 earnings base; the other is that weak non-online shopping volume and flat Payments profit cap the recovery. Fourth-quarter Fintech profit growth and the 2027 outlook will settle it.
🐂 Bull Case
Ad and Delivery Fees Lift Marketplace Take Rates
Kaspi.kz runs Kazakhstan's leading shopping, payments and banking mobile app. Even as lower item prices slowed total merchandise value, the group collected a larger fee on every sale and kept shoppers buying more often.
- Third-party e-Commerce take rate (the fee percentage charged to sellers): 16.3%, up 2.1 percentage points from a year ago
- Annualized e-Commerce purchases per shopper: 16.3, up 27% from a year ago
- Kasper, its artificial intelligence shopping assistant: 1.4 million users since its July launch, generating "average GMV per order twice that of traditional text search"
- Online grocery gross merchandise value (GMV, total value of goods sold): up 40% from a year ago
Because merchants pay extra for advertising and delivery, Marketplace revenue in constant currency grew 20%, more than double the 8% rise in merchandise value. Marketplace profit before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation, excluding one-offs (adjusted EBITDA), rose 8% to KZT 124 billion.
What to watch: fourth-quarter e-Commerce revenue growth against merchandise value growth after the new generation of Kasper launches later this year. A continuing 10-percentage-point gap would show that advertising and AI tools can drive revenue even when item prices fall.
A Second Deposit Rate Cut Lowers Funding Costs
High interest rates on customer savings accounts have squeezed profit in Fintech, the group's lending and deposit arm, for two years. In the third quarter, Fintech adjusted EBITDA still dipped 1% from a year ago to KZT 179 billion, even though segment revenue grew 19%.
Chief executive Mikheil Lomtadze said the Kazakh group "reduced our three-month deposit rate by 100 basis points in both August and October, and expect the benefits to become increasingly visible in 2027". Because three-month accounts make up about a third of customer deposits, lower payouts take one quarter to flow through.
Those two 1-percentage-point cuts already helped enough that the company kept its full-year profit outlook unchanged despite lower shopping volume. What to watch: fourth-quarter Fintech adjusted EBITDA growth in the full-year report. A return to high-single-digit growth would show the deposit cuts are lifting lending margins.
Turkish Shopping Loans Reach 8% of Phone Sales
Kaspi.kz bought Turkish online retailer Hepsiburada and a local banking licence to copy its Kazakh lending model in Türkiye, while bears worry about Turkish currency drops and spending costs. Over the year to September, the Turkish lira fell 32% against the tenge, which pulled reported tenge Marketplace revenue down 15% by our math.
Beneath the currency hit, Turkish shoppers bought 11% more often than a year ago. In October, Hepsicredit, the new consumer loan product, financed about 8% of smartphone sales on Hepsiburada, up from 0.4% of total merchandise value in June, and Lomtadze said the team continues to "expect investments in Türkiye to moderate significantly next year".
What to watch: Hepsicredit's share of total Hepsiburada merchandise value and 2027 Turkish spending plans in the full-year results. Expanding beyond smartphones while spending moderates would turn Türkiye from an earnings drag into a contributor.
🐻 Bear Case
Stronger Tenge Cuts the Marketplace Outlook
Three months ago, management kept its full-year target of around 20% constant-currency growth in Marketplace gross merchandise value (GMV) and pointed to faster trends in the second half. Lomtadze now says a 20% drop in the US dollar against the tenge cuts import costs, while "lower average selling values and easing inflation moderate GMV growth today".
- Full-year constant-currency Marketplace GMV outlook: cut to around 12%, down from around 20%
- Third-quarter constant-currency Marketplace GMV growth: 8%, down from 15% in the second quarter
- Third-quarter constant-currency e-Commerce GMV growth: 17%, down from 28% in the second quarter
- Kazakhstan e-Commerce volume vs price: items sold rose 24%, but value per item fell 8%
The slowdown cuts against the prior second-half recovery story because third-quarter comparisons were already easy after last year's iPhone supply shortages in Kazakhstan. Even on that low base, total Marketplace GMV grew less than half as fast as e-Commerce GMV, which suggests merchant-store shopping (m-Commerce) barely grew.
What to watch: fourth-quarter constant-currency Marketplace GMV growth against the roughly 8% pace implied by the new full-year outlook by our math. Another drop in average item value would show that currency deflation is still holding back top-line commission volume.
Palm-Payment Spending Keeps Payments Profit Flat
Payments, the division that processes merchant QR codes, cards and bill payments, grew total payment value (TPV) 14% in constant currency to KZT 13.6 trillion. Segment revenue rose only 6% to KZT 182 billion because merchant fee rates have been drifting lower.
Segment adjusted EBITDA stayed flat at KZT 105 billion, "reflecting investments in Kaspi Alaqan", its pay-by-palm terminal network. Giving free terminals and introductory fee waivers to merchants has kept Payments profit from growing all year.
What to watch: Payments adjusted EBITDA growth in the fourth quarter once early Alaqan merchants pass their three-month fee-free window. Flat profit alongside mid-teens volume growth would show that lower fee rates are permanently eating the volume gains.
Risks this quarter didn't answer
Because the company treats first-quarter and third-quarter announcements as shorter trading updates, three standing risks got no new numbers in the release.
- Overdue loans and loss reserves: non-performing loans rose to 7.0% of gross loans in June while reserve coverage fell to 76%; the full-year report will show whether credit quality stabilised.
- New loan originations (total finance volume): omitted for a second quarter after falling 2% in the first quarter; full-year tables will show whether new lending volume recovered.
- Bank tax and central bank reserve drags: no update on how higher mandatory cash reserves at the National Bank of Kazakhstan affected third-quarter net income.
👓 Other Themes
Magnum Daily Enters Neighbourhood Grocery
Building on its online grocery business, the group completed a 42-store pilot of Magnum Daily convenience shops in Almaty with an adjusted EBITDA margin of about 15%. Because the shops are "supplied by our existing e-Grocery darkstores and operated by local partners", Lomtadze plans to scale to around 300 stores by the end of 2027 and 3,000 over the medium term.
💲 Other KPIs
Fintech revenue rose 19% from a year ago, slowing from 25% in the first quarter and 23% in the second quarter. Growth followed the average net loan portfolio — total loans to customers net of loss reserves — which rose 14% from a year ago to about KZT 7.5 trillion by our math.
Net profit edged up 0.6% from a year ago by our math, after dipping 1.1% in the first quarter and 0.2% in the second quarter. Consolidated adjusted EBITDA grew 1% to KZT 408 billion as high deposit interest expenses and Turkish expansion costs offset 18% constant-currency revenue growth.
The board proposed a quarterly payout of KZT 1,000 per American Depositary Share, unchanged from the second quarter and up from KZT 850 in the first quarter. By our math, the payout equals about 68% of third-quarter net income.
🔮 Guidance
Cut. Management lowered its full-year constant-currency Marketplace merchandise value growth target by 8 percentage points, "reflecting lower value per items sold in Kazakhstan amid tenge appreciation". By our math, after 19% growth in the first quarter, 15% in the second and 8% in the third, the new plan leaves about 8% growth for the fourth quarter.
Unchanged. The full-year plan still calls for about 5% growth in consolidated adjusted EBITDA, because "Softer GMV growth trends are broadly offset at the adjusted EBITDA level by lower Fintech funding costs". By our math, after 6.9% growth in the first half and 1.0% in the third quarter, hitting 5% for the year requires about 5.6% growth in the fourth quarter.
Unchanged. The full-year outlook stays at around 15% growth in total payment value. After 14% growth in the first quarter, 13% in the second and 14% in the third, reaching 15% for the full year requires about 19% growth in the fourth quarter by our math.
Unchanged. The full-year plan still targets around 15% growth in the average net loan portfolio. Because the portfolio grew 23% in the first quarter, 18% in the second and 14% in the third, the full-year target is already well covered and leaves room for slower growth in the fourth quarter.
❓ Key Questions
Did non-performing loans and reserve coverage stabilise in Q3?
Non-performing loans climbed from 6.1% of gross loans in December to 7.0% in June while reserve coverage dropped from 80% to 76%. Because the third-quarter release omitted credit metrics, investors cannot see whether longer-term loans are still pushing defaults higher.
What happened to physical store Marketplace volume in Q3?
Constant-currency e-Commerce merchandise value grew 17%, but total Marketplace merchandise value rose only 8%. Management did not publish separate numbers for m-Commerce (in-store merchant transactions) or Kaspi Travel, which make up the other half of the Marketplace.
How much capital will 300 Magnum Daily stores require?
Scaling from 42 pilot convenience shops to 300 by the end of 2027 and 3,000 over the medium term is a major physical retail expansion. Management said local partners operate the stores, but did not disclose Kaspi.kz's store-opening costs.
What was third-quarter total finance volume (loan originations)?
Management switched its lending outlook to the average loan portfolio last quarter after new loan originations fell 2% in the first quarter. Without the origination flow figure, readers cannot tell how much portfolio growth comes from longer loan durations versus new borrowing.