The country’s largest steel maker, the state-owned, Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) on Monday announced a 20.33% rise in its profit after tax at Rs 1,835 crore for the quarter ended, June 2008.
The company registered an increase of 33.85% in its revenues corresponding to the same quarter last year, which stood at Rs 12,138 crore. The results come at a time when the steel producers have agreed to the government’s demand of freezing the steel prices in order to curb inflation level in the economy, which has risen to a 13-year high in the past 12 years.
Despite a leap in the input costs such as coal, ferro alloys, freight and the wages which hiked the costs by Rs 1,434 crore and price freeze since May the company registered an increase in its sales on account of increase, mainly due to 10% growth in domestic sales over the corresponding period of last fiscal, which stood at 2.62 million tonne.
SAIL said that the first-quarter profit soared on the back of higher output of higher grade products, which are used by carmakers and railways.
During Q1, the company’s debt-equity ratio improved to 0.11:1 from 0.13:1 as on March 31, 2008 with reduction in borrowings by Rs 260.55 crore.
With pace of projects under the expansion plan picking up, capital expenditure during the quarter at Rs 737 crore doubled over the corresponding period of the previous fiscal.