Phillips Carbon Black Ltd, an RPG Group company and the country's largest carbon black manufacturer, has posted a loss of Rs 45.98 crore for the quarter ended December 31 as falling oil prices induced a fall in carbon black prices. Net sales for the quarter increased by a marginal 4.4 per cent.
"As the price of raw material fell by 50 per cent during the quarter, carbon black prices were lower by over 30 per cent since September last year.", informed A Goyal, managing director, PCBL.
The company could not cash in on the falling prices as it had forward bookings for import of raw materials. Interestingly, its raw material costs went up from Rs170.64 crore same quarter last fiscal to Rs256.72 crore in Q3FY09. Carbon black prices were now in the range of Rs50,000 to Rs55,000 per metric tonne, depending on the grade.
Goyal added that demand is unlikely to pick up in the upcoming quarter as well,as demand is already lower by 55 to 60 per cent in January. PCBL had to cut production by 40 per cent. It has an installed capacity of 2,70,000 tonnes per annum.