 "HPCL Q2 results: Net profit slumps 98% on fall in refining, fuel margin")
State-owned Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) on Friday reported a massive 97.5 per cent drop in net profit in the September quarter, as refinery margins fell and marketing margins shrunk.
HPCL reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 142.67 crore in July-September -- the second quarter of the current 2024-25 fiscal year -- compared to a profit of Rs 5,826.96 crore a year back, according to a stock exchange filing by the company.
Net profit also declined sequentially, when compared to an earning of Rs 633.94 crore in the April-June period.
Pre-tax earnings from downstream fuel retailing businesses slumped to Rs 1,285.96 crore from Rs 6,984.60 crore in July-September 2023.
The company and other state-owned fuel retailers -- Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) -- had last year made extraordinary gains from holding petrol and diesel prices despite a drop in cost.
The price freeze was justified in the name of recovering losses BPCL and the other two retailers had suffered in the previous year when they did not raise retail prices despite a surge in cost.
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The gains arising from the price freeze were eroded with petrol and diesel prices being cut by Rs 2 per litre each just before general elections were announced. This together with a drop in product cracks or margins on relatively stable crude oil prices led to a fall in profits.
Cracks -- the difference between raw material crude oil and final product price -- have shrunk from highs of 2022-23.