The stock of Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) rose by nearly 13 per cent last week. This may not be surprising, given the impressive results posted by the company in the recent March quarter.
The company had started posting profits from the third quarter of FY-18 after reeling under losses for many quarters. Its profits in the December quarter were modest, at ₹43 crore. But profits increased by nearly 19 times to ₹815 crore in the fourth quarter. The company had posted a loss of ₹771 crore for the same period last year.
The revenue for the recent March quarter grew 34. 3 per cent Y-o-Y to ₹17,037 crore. This was mainly driven by higher steel realisations and improved steel volumes. Steel realisations too grew 24 per cent Y-o-Y to about ₹45,000 per tonne, also aided by higher volumes of value-added products in the overall mix.