• ZCCM-IH recorded a net loss in 2025which was largely driven by a non-recurring gain from the Mopani restructuring.
• The company was ordered to pay approximately USD 89 million following a London arbitration ruling in favour of Trafigura, while simultaneously clearing its last major legacy debt
• Underlying royalty income from Kansanshi’s S3 expansion and progress on energy assets (CEC and Maamba) point to improving fundamentals in Zambia’s copper and power sectors

Harare- ZCCM Investment Holdings, Zambia's only listed diversified mining and energy investment company, reported a net loss of ZMW 2.79 billion, equivalent to USD 110.7 million, for the year ended 31 December 2025, compared to a net profit of ZMW 39.85 billion, or USD 1.52 billion, in FY2024, in provisional unaudited results released on 30 June 2026 that tell three distinct EVENTS whose combination makes the release one of the most analytically instructive results packages published on any African exchange in the first half of 2026.

The swing of approximately USD 1.63 billion in net income between two consecutive years is the headline the 2025 results present and the context the 2024 results make necessary to understand, because the 2024 net profit of USD 1.52 billion was not a sustainable earnings achievement whose collapse in 2025 represents a business in structural decline.

It was the recognition of an exceptional, non-recurring gain arising from the Mopani Strategic Equity Partner Transaction, the deal through which International Resources Holding acquired a controlling stake in Mopani Copper Mines, generating a gain of ZMW 35.03 billion on the subsidiary loan modification recorded in 2024's income statement.

When one removes that non-recurring gain and 2024's underlying performance was a loss. The 2025 loss of USD 110.7 million is therefore not a deterioration from a USD 1.52 billion profit base, but from a baseline that, once the exceptional gain is stripped out, was already loss-making.

The 2025 operating loss of USD 65.1 million, against the prior year's operating profit of USD 1.44 billion, confirmed the structural picture.

Revenue at group level collapsed from USD 122.7 million in 2024 to USD 6.7 million in 2025, a reduction whose explanation is the same exceptional Mopani transaction. The 2024 revenue line included the Mopani restructuring proceeds that did not recur in 2025. The company-level income statement, which reflects ZCCM-IH's own financial performance rather than that of its operating subsidiaries and associates on a consolidated basis, told a more instructive analysis about the underlying business trajectory.

Investment income at company level rose from ZMW 2.42 billion in 2024 to ZMW 3.38 billion in 2025, a 39.8% increase driven by higher royalty earnings from Kansanshi Mining following the commissioning of the S3 expansion project, while the company-level loss narrowed from ZMW 4.38 billion in 2024 to ZMW 1.18 billion in 2025, a USD 120.8 million improvement confirming that the underlying investment holding company is generating more income and incurring lower exceptional charges than the prior year, even as the group-level consolidation reflects the absence of the Mopani non-recurring gain.

However, the most significant disclosure in the results was not the headline loss but the recognition of a ZMW 973 million, or USD 44 million, provision following the final arbitral award issued on 22 May 2026 by the London Court of International Arbitration Tribunal in relation to a claim by Trafigura Group Pte Limited. The LCIA ordered ZCCM-IH to pay approximately USD 69.31 million in principal, USD 19.74 million in accrued interest, and approximately GBP 1.86 million in legal and arbitration costs, a combined liability approaching USD 91 million before further accruing interest.

The arbitration relates to a guarantee issued by ZCCM-IH in July 2021 in connection with Konkola Copper Mines PLC, determined binding on the company in a Partial Final Award issued in December 2025 before the quantum was established at the May 2026 final hearing. The USD 44 million provision represents management's estimate of settlement proceeds given ongoing negotiations, implying that ZCCM-IH's management believes it can settle the USD 91 million gross liability at approximately a 52% discount through negotiated settlement, an outcome whose achievement depends on Trafigura's willingness to accept a significant haircut on a legally confirmed award.

The logic that this amount will be fully recovered from Konkola Copper Mines under a Tripartite Reimbursement Agreement signed with KCM and the Government of the Republic of Zambia provides the accounting basis for ZCCM-IH's settlement position, but either KCM's financial position supports full reimbursement within the timeline that Trafigura's settlement negotiations require is the risk that the Tripartite Agreement structure does not fully eliminate.

Against the operational difficulties at Mopani and Konkola, Kansanshi Mining PLC's S3 Expansion project, commissioned in August 2025 with commercial production declared in December 2025, was the most commercially positive operational development in the 2025 results narrative.

 Kansanshi achieved its highest annual copper production since 2021, with total output reaching 170,929 tonnes, driven by the S3 circuit achieving 90% of its design capacity within five months of initial production. The copper price during the period rose from USD 9,177 per tonne in January 2025 to USD 12,950 per tonne, a 41% increase, meaning Kansanshi produced more copper at a materially higher price per tonne than in any prior year, and the royalty income that ZCCM-IH receives from its 20% economic interest in Kansanshi reflects both dimensions of that improvement simultaneously.

The increase in royalty income from Kansanshi was the primary driver of company-level investment income growth from ZMW 2.42 billion to ZMW 3.38 billion, real cash-generating income that requires no exceptional gain, no restructuring, and no arbitration provision to produce.

The Mingomba project's development trajectory provides the medium-term copper production upside that ZCCM-IH's 2026 and 2027 results will increasingly reflect, with 147,274.80 metres of cumulative drilling completed since inception in 2023, surface rights secured for the tailings storage facility, three test shaft pilot holes drilled, and a Mineral Resource Estimate targeted for Q3 2026 completion, moving Mingomba from exploration to resource definition at a pace whose commercial significance for ZCCM-IH's long-term earnings potential is substantial.

The most strategically significant pattern in ZCCM-IH's 2025 to 2026 operational results was the acceleration of its energy platform construction, a diversification that responds to the fundamental insight that Zambia's copper mining ambitions are constrained less by ore grades or capital availability than by reliable, affordable electricity whose supply the country's drought-depleted hydropower base cannot guarantee.

CEC's Itimpi II Solar PV plant, 136 megawatts, commissioned in the first quarter of 2026 and the largest operational solar plant in Zambia, represents the most immediately visible energy investment in the group's portfolio, with ZCCM-IH increasing its shareholding in CEC from 32.41% to 33.51% during the period.

Maamba Energy Limited's Phase II expansion from 300 megawatts to 600 megawatts, with ZCCM-IH's USD 35 million equity commitment fully disbursed by mid-2026, doubled the baseload thermal capacity that anchors Zambia's mining sector's power security during periods when ZESCO's hydropower supply is constrained by low Kariba water levels, while the Maamba Solar Energy Limited 100 megawatt solar project adds renewable capacity at the same site targeting commissioning by August 2026 under a 20-year PPA with ZESCO.

The Ever Great Energy Company, a 2 x 300 megawatt coal-fired thermal project in Sinazongwe District whose USD 451.7 million total cost includes a dedicated coal mine development, represents the baseload insurance policy for a mining sector whose power requirements exceed what solar and hydro alone can reliably supply during extended drought seasons.

ZCCM-IH also eliminated its last legacy debt obligation in April 2026 by repaying a USD 150 million loan owed to Glencore, a deleveraging milestone that reduces the finance cost burden on future periods and improves ZCCM-IH's balance sheet flexibility for the investment commitments that Mingomba's development and the energy platform's continued expansion will require.

Zimbabwe does not have a ZCCM-IH. It has the Mutapa Investment Fund, a sovereign wealth vehicle established in 2023 to manage Zimbabwe's strategic public sector assets and investments, whose portfolio includes POSB, NetOne, TelOne, Air Zimbabwe, and a range of other state entities. Mutapa is not listed on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange or the VFEX, it publishes neither quarterly or half-year results, nor issues SENS announcements. Its portfolio's performance, the royalties generated from ZCDC's diamond production, the dividends from financial sector stakes, the capital returns from energy investments, is not visible to institutional investors, pension funds, or retail shareholders in a format that allows commercial assessment, portfolio weighting, or market discipline to apply.

The consequence of that invisibility is that Zimbabwe's mineral economy, gold generating an estimated USD 7 billion in annual export revenue at current prices, diamonds contributing USD 220 million, and lithium with a potential whose scale Arcadia's production has begun to establish, is not accessible to a domestic investor seeking equity exposure to that mineral production through a regulated, listed, publicly disclosed investment vehicle.

A Zambian pension fund can buy ZCCM-IH shares on the LuSE and gain diversified exposure to copper at Kansanshi, Mopani, Konkola, Lubambe, and CNMC Luanshya, to energy through CEC and Maamba, and to gold through Kyalo Goldfields, through a single listed security whose performance is disclosed semi-annually and whose management is accountable to a shareholder base that can trade the stock in response to the results it produces. A Zimbabwean pension fund seeking equivalent exposure to Zimbabwe's gold and diamond production has no comparable mechanism.

The ZCCM-IH results, including the profit collapse, the Trafigura arbitration, the Kansanshi royalty upside, and the energy platform construction, are all publicly visible, commercially assessable, and market-priced. The good decisions are rewarded and the poor decisions are penalised through a share price mechanism whose discipline applies continuously rather than at periodic government review.

Zimbabwe's equivalent mineral wealth is managed by an entity whose performance the market cannot assess because the market cannot see it. The Mutapa Investment Fund's listing on the VFEX, at whatever valuation its portfolio of strategic assets supports, is the single institutional reform that would most directly connect Zimbabwe's mineral economy to the domestic and international capital market discipline that ZCCM-IH's listed status applies to Zambia's.

The ZCCM-IH 2025 results, loss and all, are more commercially useful to Zambia's capital markets than the most optimistic Mutapa statement would be without the discipline that a public listing imposes.

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