Companies with sales above Rs 500 crore each, particularly in the oil and petrochemical sectors, underperformed the corporate sector by reporting a five per cent decline in sales during the quarter ended December 2001.
The corporate sector as a whole (quarterly performance of 2,133 companies available so far) recorded a drop of 2.5 per cent in sales turnover.
However, where growth in net profit is concerned, these majors have outperformed the sector.
As many as 48 companies with quarterly sales of over Rs 500 crore each have reported a decline in net profit at 7.4 per cent, compared with an 18.7 per cent decline in net profit of the corporate sector as a whole.
The quarterly performance of 2,133 companies, disaggregated by the size of sales turnover, shows that companies in the sales turnover brackets of Rs 250-500 crore and Rs 100-250 crore have recorded positive sales growth.
The sales of 65 companies in the Rs 250-50 crore bracket rose by 6.3 per cent, while the sales of 152 companies in the Rs 100-250 bracket reported increased at 1.7 per cent.
The 48 companies with sales income of over Rs 500 crore accounted for 58 per cent of the aggregate sample. They reported a 4.9 per cent decline in sales at Rs 1,09,828 crore.
However, if one excludes oil companies from the sample, the sales of 41 companies shows a marginal rise of three per cent.
Nearly all the four segments classified on the basis of sales have recorded a drop in net profit. The worst performers were the 1,868 companies in the lowest bracket (sales of Rs 100-250 crore).
They reported an aggregate net loss of Rs 505.5 crore as against a net profit of Rs 52.3 crore same quarter previous year.
The pathetic bottomline show was on the back of a dip of 3.4 per cent in sales. These 1,868 companies accounted for 17 per cent to sample aggregate sales.
Interestingly, the 152 companies in the Rs 100-250 crore sales bracket recorded the largest drop in net profit of 27.4 per cent.
