On the profit front, operating profit of these 275 companies rose by 34.6 per cent to Rs 15,076 crore during April-September '99. Gross profit of these companies rose marginally by 4.8 per cent to Rs 6,529 crore in April-September '99 from the level of Rs 6,230 crore in April-September '98.

Profit before tax increased by 4 per cent to Rs 4,142 crore in April-September '99. The aggregate net profit of these companies increased by 4.9 per cent to Rs 3,354 crore in April-September '99 from the level of Rs 3,197 crore in April-September 98. The PAT to sales ratio of these companies declined from 7.77 per cent to 7.26 per cent during April-September '99. This indicates that the corporate sector shows lower return during the first half.

Of the 275 companies, 30 companies more than doubled their gross profits. Mention may be made of Balmar Lawrie-Van Leer, Clamour Trading Co, Dalal Street Investment, Fortis Financial Services, Godrej Soaps, Himalaya International, Indo Green, Kunal Overseas, Machino Plastics, Marathwada Refractories, Pioneer Profin, Poona Industrial Hotel, Soni Infosys, Spenta International, Tata Honeywell and Triumph Intl Finance. Among these companies highest growth of 1912.3 per cent was reported by Godrej Soaps. On the other hand, 68 companies showed lower gross profit ascompared with that of the corresponding half year period of the previous year.

Significant declines were noticed in the case of Bombay Drugs (-67.8 per cent), Golkunda Diamonds (-75.6 per cent), Ispat Alloys (-76.8 per cent), Mangalore Chemicals (-80.0 per cent), Rathi Mercantile (-78.0 per cent), Vinyl Chemicals (-69.3 per cent) and VXL Instruments (-81.1 per cent). In PBT, 28 companies have recorded an increase of 100 per cent or more. Of these Bombay Swadeshi showed a highest growth of 983.3 per cent during the period April-September '99. Its sales also rose by 63.7 per cent to Rs 6.50 crore during April-September '99 from the level of Rs 3.97 crore during April-September '98.

However, 66 companies have recorded a lower PBT. In the case of PAT, 29 companies have reported an increase of 100 per cent or more mention may be made of Advance Micronic Devices, ANG Exports, Bombay Swadeshi, Clamour Trading Co, Dalal Street Investment, Deep Diamond, Indo Green, Kunal Overseas, Soni Infosys, Symcom Formulation,Tata Honeywell, Triumph Intl Finance and Vinati Organics. As many as 66 companies recorded lower net profits. Notable among them are Bombay Drugs (-86.1 per cent), Golkunda Diamonds (-86.5 per cent), Indian Resort Hotels (-81.0 per cent), Kesoram Industries (-96.5 per cent), Rathi Mercantile Indus (-86.4 per cent), Universal Cables (-95.0 per cent) and Vinyl Chemicals (-97.0 per cent).

Among the 275 companies significant loss made by the companies like Baroda Rayon (-Rs 43.30 crore), Century Textiles (-Rs 43.45 crore), DCL Polyesters (-Rs 13.38 crore), Floatglass India (-Rs 19.21 crore), Global Boards (-Rs 13.12 crore), Mafatlal Finance (-Rs 22.37 crore), Maskara Industries (-Rs 11.69 crore), Narmada Cement (-Rs 11.78 crore), Southern Iron & Steel (-Rs 18.62 crore) and Textool Company (-Rs 11.80 crore) during the period April-September '99.

Among the 275 companies, the top five in respect of PAT to sales ratio during April-September '99 were JK Chemicals, Clamour Trading, Poonmudi Agencies, IndianInfotech and Hind Industrial Resources.

Profit after tax formed less than 0.5 per cent of sales during April-September '99 in the case of Ginni International, Kesoram Industries, Muller & Phipps, Oriental Carbon, Tata Engineering and Universal Cables.A significant increase in the ratio during April-September '99 from the level of April-September '98 was recorded by Anna Finance, Bombay Swadeshi, Clamour Trading, Deep Diamond, Garnet Construction, Hind Industrial Resources, Indo Green, Industrial & Prudential Inv, JK Chemicals, Machino Plastics, Marathawada Refractories, Nava Bharat Refrageration, Poonmudi Agencies, Sharyans Resources, and Triumph Intl Finance. A reverse trend can be seen in the case of Brescon Corporate, Dalal Street Investment, DSQ Software, Era Financial Services, Marsons Power, Rathi Mercantile Indus, Vindhya Telelinks and VMC Software.

Aggregates
This week's additions of 275 companies with 501 previous weeks companies results showed an increase in sales and profits. Thetotal of 776 companies sales increased by 19.1 per cent to Rs 2,42,393 crore during April-September '99 from the level of Rs 2,03,504 crore during April-September '98. Other income of these companies increased by 4.8 per cent to Rs 7,791 crore during the period April-September '99 from the level of Rs 7,433 crore during April-September '98.

These companies have posted a rise of 13.6 per cent to Rs 16,680 crore in profit after tax during April-September '99 from the level of Rs 14,689 crore recorded during April-September '98. One significant thing is that all the profit growth were double digits.

Operating profit, gross profit and PBT increased by 24.3 per cent to Rs 63,717 crore, 15.3 per cent to Rs 32,241 crore, and 13.1 per cent to Rs 20,492 crore respectively during April-September '99 from the level of April-September '98.