Varun Beverages Ltd, PepsiCo's largest franchise bottler, on Tuesday reported 50 per cent jump in consolidated net profit at Rs 60.06 crore for the March quarter 2020, helped by volume growth across its domestic and international markets.
The company, which follows calendar year as its financial year, posted a net profit of Rs 40.04 crore in January-March 2019.
Total income during the latest quarter stood at Rs 1,724.51 crore, up 24.78 per cent from Rs 1,382 crore in the year-ago period , Varun Beverages said in a regulatory filing.
We started the new fiscal year on a strong note with healthy demand and robust volume growth across our domestic and international markets. This enabled us to deliver a topline growth of 23.3 per cent, EBITDA growth of 24.2 per cent, and PAT growth of 50 per cent during the quarter, Varun Beverages Chairman Ravi Jaipuria said.
He however noted that in the last 10 days of March, a country-wide lockdown and similar restrictions in many other countries moderated the company's performance for the period which would have otherwise been even better.
Varun Beverages' total expenses in the latest quarter were at Rs 1,650.18 crore as against Rs 1,320.28 crore in the year-ago period.
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On the outlook, the company said though the demand in domestic and international markets is curtailed, it is expected to get normal in the near term.
While we are currently witnessing curtailed demand both in India and in our international geographies as a result of the ongoing macro-situation, we believe, in the near-term there should be a gradual bounce back in volumes. This will be enabled by easing of lockdown restrictions and restoration of consumer sentiment as they will once again have normal access to beverage purchases, said Jaipuria.
He further said:Given the increasing demand that we witnessed for all our products prior to the lockdown, we are confident that once things stabilise, we will once again see encouraging growth and we will further strengthen our position as the leading player in the beverage industry.
Shares of Varun Beverages were trading at Rs 621.55 per scrip, up 0.74 per cent, on the BSE.