Tata Steel today said its sales rose by 10 per cent to 2.35 million tonnes (MT) in the quarter ended December 31, up from 2.13 MT in the year-ago period.
For the first three quarter of the current fiscal its sales rose by 8 per cent to 6.83 MT from 6.34 MT during the April-December period of 2014-15.
The Mumbai-based firm's crude steel production rose by 11 per cent to 2.55 MT in the third quarter of 2015-16 compared with 2.29 MT during the same quarter in 2014-15, it said in a regulatory filing.
Steel production during April-December period of 2015-16 rose by 7 per cent to 7.4 MT as against 6.89 MT in the year-ago period, it added.
Despite the positive production and sales figures for the last quarter, shares of Tata Steel fell by 1.26 per cent to 250.50 at BSE in the afternoon trade.
Saleable steel output was up by 13 per cent to 2.51 MT as against 2.22 MT during the quarter under review.
For the first three quarters this fiscal saleable steel production rose by 7 per cent to 7.15 MT compared to 6.68 MT during April-December of 2014-15.
Hot metal production rose by 13 per cent to 2.69 MT during October-December of 2015-16 from 2.38 MT in the year-ago period. During April-December 2015-16 it was up by 6 per cent to 7.94 MT from 7.49 MT in the corresponding period of last fiscal.
"Pellet Plant has achieved best ever Q3 production of 1.43 MT (Previous best 1.03 MT in Q3 FY'15). Sinter Plant has achieved best ever Q3 production of 2.05 MT (Previous best 1.91 MT in Q3 FY'14)," it said.
The blast furnaces achieved lowest best ever coke rate of 372 kg/thm in Q3 (Previous best 435 kg/thm in Q3 FY10) and highest best ever coal rate of 172 kg/thm in Q3 (Previous best 130 kg/thm in Q3 FY14), it added.
In December last year, Tata Steel said it has signed a
Letter of Intent with Greybull Capital to enter into exclusive negotiations for potential sale of Long Products Europe.
Executive Chairman of the Long Products Europe business Bimlendra Jha said: "This sale is the best possible outcome for employees who have worked relentlessly to ensure the business's survival, and helped to make it attractive to a potential buyer."
The agreement follows negotiations between Tata Steel UK and Greybull Capital and is an important milestone towards continuing steelmaking in Scunthorpe and steel processing in other locations in the UK and France, the India giant said.
Tata Steel Europe CEO Hans Fischer said: "Under these current challenging market conditions in Europe with the soaring levels of imports from China, we are happy that Tata Steel UK and Greybull Capital have entered the final stage of completion of the sale of shareholding in Longs Steel UK."
This transaction will offer a future for Long Products Europe business and its 4,400 employees in the UK, he added.
The sale covers several UK-based assets including the Scunthorpe steelworks, two mills in Teesside, an engineering workshop in Workington, a design consultancy in York and the associated distribution facilities, as well as a mill in northern France.
On the sale of the entire UK business, Tata Steel Europe said: "It is the intention of Tata Steel Europe to run a thorough, but expedited sale process by reaching out to a wide universe of potential investors globally."
The formal process has commenced "today" with despatch of the Summary Information Memorandum to potential investors, it added.
Tata Steel and its advisers are committed to working together and conducting the process in a transparent and time bound manner, the firm said.
Last month, Tata Steel put its entire UK business on the block, a development that has put thousands of jobs at risk amid a deepening crisis in Britain's once-storied sector that the Indian conglomerate had entered nearly a decade ago with a USD 14-billion takeover with much fanfare.
