Coal India pre-tax profit falls 5% in Q2 to Rs 4,060 crore

Revenue from operations up 3.78% year-on-year; board approves interim dividend

State-owned miner Coal India limited (CIL) witnessed a fall in profit by 5.07 per cent during the second quarter of the current financial year over corresponding period last fiscal. The company registered a profit before tax (PBT) of Rs 4,060 crore in the Q2.

For the half year ending September 2020, the PBT of CIL slipped by 39.2 per cent to Rs 6,860 crore. During H1 of last fiscal, its PBT stood at Rs 11,288 crore.

CIL’s consolidated revenue from operations increased by 3.78 per cent year-on-year to Rs 21,153.07 crore. The total income of the company saw a marginal increase of one per cent to Rs 22,237 crore.

In a presentation, CIL said coal production rose by 10.56 per cent year-on-year during the second quarter to 114.98 million tonnes. The offtake of coal increased by 9.41 per cent to 133.96 million tonnes during the similar period.

The increase comes after a lull in demand of coal during the Covid lockdiwn period. The company however still faces record high outstanding dues of the power generating companies of at Rs 22,126 crore as on September 2020.

Through its two routes of sale of coal, CIL earned Rs 15,269 crore from fuel supply agreements and Rs 3213 crore from e-auction during July-September 2020. The average realisation per tonne stood at Rs 1416 crore during the same period.

CIL recently reported a record 190 per cent increase in the volume of coal booked through its e-auction sale during October. The booked quantity of coal under all the e-auctions it holds was 16.8 Million Tonnes (MTs) in October’20, as compared to 5.8 MTs in October last year. 

The Board of CIL also approved an interim dividend. “The Board of Directors in its meeting on Wednesday had approved payment of interim dividend for the financial year 2020-21 at 7.5 per cent per share of the face value of Rs 10,” CIL said in a notice shared on the exchanges.

The company has decided November 20, 2020 as the record date for the purpose of payment of interim dividend.