The Hindu Business Line : Bell Ceramics: Banking on growth hopes

The company, which has brought only the preference shareholders on the dividend list, has been seeing a steady interest in the ex-dividend period too.

The counter today closed at Rs 31.80, marginally up, witnessed a trading quantity of 50,850 shares and its two-week daily average is around 1.43 lakh shares.

According to analysts, Bell Ceramics, one of the dominant players in the industry, is poised to take advantage of the increasing construction activity in the way forward through its expanded capacity at both its manufacturing outfits and gradually sliding cost of production.

Industry insiders suggest that the company has managed to tame the troubles at the Karnataka unit, while the plant at Dora in Gujarat has been working at 100 per cent capacity utilisation.

According to Mr Devarsh Vakil of Anagram Stockbroking, despite teething trouble in the plant at Hoskote in Karnataka, the company produced sharp growth in net profit of 551 per cent in 2004-05. "The stock traded today at an attractive valuation of 8 times its 2004-05 EPS of around Rs 4 compared to its peers," he added.

The cash earnings per shares stand around Rs 9.24 and the cash P/E ratio is around 3.5.

A fund manager said the Chinese currency appreciation is likely to benefit the domestic ceramics industry as it would reduce import and improve profitability. The VAT implementation has already benefited the industry players in terms of sales and margins, he observed.

The non-promoter holding being at around 60 per cent, the counter has been seeing sufficient liquidity on the bourse.

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