Adani Group firm Ambuja Cements’ net profit attributable to the owners dipped 90.6% year-on-year to Rs 204 crore in the third quarter of FY26.
Decoding the Numbers
Profit after tax (PAT) was lifted by one-off gains in the form of government grants and write-backs to subsidiary ACC. Normalised PAT — without the impact of one-off gains — came in at Rs 378 crore compared with Rs 106 crore in the year-ago period. Profit attributable to the owners came in behind Bloomberg estimate of Rs 734 crore.
The firm’s revenue from operations for the December quarter was Rs 10,181 crore, up 19.8% year-on-year and marginally ahead of Bloomberg estimate of Rs 10,147 crore. Earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) was up 57.4% at Rs 1,257 crore, trailing Street estimate of Rs 1,759 crore. Ebitda margin was 12.3% and Ebitda per tonne was Rs 718, up 31%.
The firm recorded quarterly sales volume of 18.9 million tonne, up 17% from the year-ago period. Realisations improved by `5/bag on-year. Its market share stood at 16.6%, share of premium cement sustained at 35% of trade sales and the volume growth of premium cement came in at 31% on-year, the company said.
Road to 155 MTPA
Its capacity at the end of the quarter was 109 million tonne per annum, with plans to add another 6 MTPA by March 2026. The firm has set a goal of 155 MTPA capacity by the end of March 2028.
“We are now working to fix some of the specific issues on cost, importantly, power cost, share of green power, fuel efficiency, improvement of WHRS / AFR (waste heat recovery systems / alternative fuel & raw materials), improvement of logistics cost, which is part of the blueprint to achieve the targeted cost of Rs 3,650 per tonne by March 2028. The cost leadership journey has resulted in a 2% lower cost of sales in Q3,” Vinod Bahety, whole time director and chief executive, Ambuja Cements, said.
Ambuja Cements’ net worth at the end of December was Rs 69,854 crore and it continued to be debt-free.
“The cement industry is expected to maintain its growth momentum. The revival of demand from Q3 has continued with the trend in Q4, providing a growth of almost around 8% for the industry for FY26,” the company added.