Hindalco Industries, an Aditya Birla group company, has reported a 7 per cent increase in net profit at ₹359 crore against ₹334 crore recorded in the same period last year, largely due to higher production and better realisation.
Revenue was up 18 per cent at ₹8,603 crore (₹7,273 crore). Of the overall sales, the aluminium business contributed ₹3,636 crore (₹2,471 crore), while copper was up at ₹4,976 crore (₹4,817 crore).
Aluminium production was up 37 per cent at 217,000 tonnes consequent to the ramp-up of Mahan and Aditya smelters. Production of alumina rose 38 per cent to 5,93,000 tonnes.
D Battacharya, Managing Director, said the company could have increased production further at the new smelters if not for the shortage of coal.
“With the rising input cost, we are working on a strategy to improve efficiency by producing more by using less resources,” he said. For instance, he said, the company consumes 15,000 kilowatt (KW) to produce about one tonne of aluminium. The target is to reduce it to 14,800 KW. Similarly, the work is on to reduce alumina consumption to 2.9 tonnes from 3 tonnes for production of one tonne of aluminium, he said.
The 36 per cent jump in profit before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation at ₹1,135 crore (₹834 crore) was almost nullified by huge outflow due to depreciation and finance cost.
With most of the company’s new projects going on stream, the depreciation cost has gone up to ₹216 crore against ₹200 crore logged in the same period last year. Finance cost nearly trebled to ₹447 crore (₹165 crore).
The company’s stock rose 2 per cent on the BSE to ₹152.85 on Thursday.