Tata Steel on Wednesday posted a consolidated net profit of Rs 14,688 crore in the quarter ended March 31, 2018, as compared to a loss of Rs 1,168 crore in the year-ago period.
The steel maker's total revenue from operations during the quarter under review stood at Rs 36,132 crore, up by 2.3 per cent from Rs 35,305 crore in the corresponding period of the previous year.
In its India operations, deliveries declined to 3.03 million tonnes in the fourth quarter of 2017-18 (FY18) as production was impacted due to an unforeseen blast furnace outage at the Kalinganagar plant.
The issue has been resolved and the plant is now running at full capacity, it said.
EBITDA for the quarter improved to Rs 4,823 crore, up by 11.5 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) as the decline in deliveries was more than offset by improved realisations.
The steel maker launched 38 new products in FY18 in its India operations and enriched products now account for 68 per cent deliveries in India while branded products contribute 46 per cent of total revenues.
"Our performance has been robust in FY18 driven by execution strategy and supported by favourable global demand-supply balance. During the year, our Indian operations delivered volume growth better than the market on the back of the ramp-up at our Kalinganagar plant and the strength of our marketing network and brand equity. Growth was broad-based across our marketing segments," its CEO and Managing Director T.V. Narendran said.
In regard to its Europe operations, the steel maker said liquid steel production declined by 1.6 per cent Quarter-on-Quarter to 2.63 million tonnes in the March quarter and FY18 production was up by 1.2 per cent to 10.69 million tonnes.
"Deliveries improved by 4.3 per cent Q-o-Q to 2.55 million tonnes in fourth quarter and FY18 deliveries increased by 0.6 per cent YoY to 9.99 million tonnes," it said in a statement.
"Tata Steel Europe had a good quarter despite currency headwinds. The UK pension scheme restructuring process has also been completed. The 50:50 JV with thyssenkrupp is progressing well and we are committed towards building a strong European portfolio," Narendran said.
The steel producer also said its Kalinganagar phase II expansion is progressing well, which will take its capacity from 13 million tonnes to 18 million tonnes of crude steel.
"Engineering work is going as per plan and construction work has also started. Total estimated project cost is Rs 23,500 crore, including Rs 16,500 crore up to HRC stage and balance on raw material handling facilities and 2.2 MTPA (million tonnes per annum) cold rolling mill.
"On the steel outlook, we are closely watching the developments in global steel trade because of US protectionist measures. However, we continue to be bullish on steel prices and spreads with improving demand situation in India," Narendran said.
Steel producer's Executive Director and CFO Koushik Chatterjee said during the year, its India business did very well with industry leading EBITDA margins and strong cash flows. The Europe performance was also improving with restructuring, plant upgrades and support from better pricing in the European Union.
"We completed two large financing transactions which apart from providing funds also gives us significant flexibility to pursue our growth plans. Our $1.3 billion international bond issue in January 2018 helped us extend our maturity profile. We also completed a $2 billion Rights Issue," Chatterjee added.
--IANS
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