A total of 484 listed non-financial companies have an interest coverage ratio lower than 1, indicating their earnings are not enough to meet their interest payments.
The number works out to 16.3 per cent of a sample of 2,971 listed companies, excluding banks and financial institutions included in the sample. This is higher than the 14.9 per cent seen for a similar sample in September last year, but lower than the 17.1 per cent in March 2019 (see adjoining chart).
In all the 484 companies had a total outstanding debt of Rs 5.6 trillion at the end of September this