Category: Breaking Corporate India Earnings News

Garware Wall Ropes (GWRL) has reported results for Q4FY08 lower than consensus estimates, owing to sluggish growth in the cordage segment.

Net sales increased 19% YoY to Rs 1.2bn, 8% short of estimates as the revenue share of the cordage business declined to 64% against the full-year average of 73%. Export sales have also been comparatively lower, comprising 33.4% of revenue in Q4FY08 as compared to 42% in FY07 and 36% in FY06. The EBITDA margin, at 13.2%, was 100bps lower due to rising crude prices, which led to higher input costs for cordage products.

For the current year, higher execution in the geo-synthetics business is likely to offset the slowdown in weak fibers of cordage.

Inox Leisure reported a subdued topline growth for 4QFY2008 of 18.4% yoy to Rs39.3cr (Rs33.2cr) as lower Occupancy (4Q is a seasonally weak quarter) led to a muted 13.4% yoy growth in Footfall. The numbers are strictly comparable because of the inclusion of Calcutta Cine Pvt Ltd in this quarter. For FY2008, Inox registered 30.6% yoy growth in Revenues to Rs185cr (Rs141cr) driven by addition of property leading to a 35% jump in footfalls.

Operating Margins: Inox delivered a dismal performance for the quarter registering a 790bp decline in Operating Margin to 10% (17.9%) largely owing to a sharp 782bp increase in Other expenditure and 287bp rise in Staff costs owing to a lower revenue base.

At the end of March-08, Inox had 76 screens and 23,199 seats under operation. Inox will add – Faridabad (four screens with 1,108 seats) and Nagpur (four screens with 1,214 seats) taking its total tally to 84 screens.

Compared to Inox, PVR delivered much better results.

Earlier we have presented statistics on the market share of all the Life Insurance companies in India including LIC [Public Sector]. Today lets analyze the difference in market share of Private Sector Life Insurance Companies over a Year’s time.

Top 5 Life Insurance Companies in India at the end of April-2008 are:
ICICI Prudential Life – 22.1%
Bajaj Allianz – 13.8%
SBI Life – 9.8%
Reliance Life – 8%
Max New York – 8%

Top 5 Gaines in Life Insurance Business in a Year:
Reliance Life +3.9% gain in total private life insurance market share
Birla Sunlife +3.3% gain in total private life insurance market share
Met Life +2.8% gain in total private life insurance market share
Aviva +2% gain in total private life insurance market share
SBI Life +1.7% gain in total private life insurance market share

Top Losers in Life Insurance Business in a Year:
ICICI Prudential Life – 8.3% loss in total private life insurance market share
Bajaj Allianz – 2.4% loss in total private life insurance market share
HDFC Standard Life – 1.2% loss in total private life insurance market share

From the above data, the reason is now obvious on why K.V.Kamath, wanted to list ICICI Prudential Life as a separate entity on the bourses.

With the Indian Inflation out of control, India’s central bank – RBI stepped in late last evening and hiked the repo rate – the rate at which it lends/injects money by 25bps to 8%. The reverse repo rate – the rate at which RBI absorbs liquidity and the CRR were left unchanged at 6% and 8.25%.

Since the uptrend in inflation from 3% levels in Oct 07 to 8%, the RBI has used the CRR as a liquidity absorbtion tool and raised the CRR 75bps in the same period from 7.75% in Sept07 to 8.25% in May08. Despite a deceleration in the macro momentum, in a pre-election year, inflation will continue to get priority over growth.

Home Loan and Auto Loan are likely to see equivalent rise in lending rates [~ 0.25%]

Elecon Engineering Ltd’s [EEL] Q4FY2008 results are below expectations. Revenue below estimates at Rs3.3 bn and 16% yoy growth and net profit below estimates at Rs230 mn and 30% yoy growth.

For FY2008, Elecon Engineering (EEL) reported net profit growth at 26% yoy to Rs672 mn and earnings of Rs7.2/Share, below estimates. Led by slippages in new business, we have revised our revenue estimates by 15.1% (Rs11.5 bn) and 23.2% (Rs14.0 bn) for FY2009E and FY2010E respectively. Consequently, the net profit estimates are revised by 22.1% (Rs840 mn) and 31.6% (Rs992 mn) for FY2009E and FY2010E respectively.

EEL order book at Rs12.9 bn, in line with our expectations. The order book has grown at 55% from Rs8.3 bn to Rs12.9 bn. The current order book indicates robust visibility at 1.6X FY2008 revenues, best in last 5 years.

It seems like Malvinder Singh’s uncle, Analjit Singh has a deep influence on the former when it runs to corporate and business practices. Ranbaxy, the dream company of late Dr.Parvinder Singh is likely to be sold to Daiichi. Singh family controls 34% stake in Ranbaxy Labs.

If you recall, Analjit Singh successfully ventured into Paging business in early 90s and sold it off at the peak to Hutchison by virtue of which he got stake in Hutchison India, later Hutchison Essar. Hutchison sold their stake at peak just last year to Vodafone. Analjit Singh made a killing by patiently holding on to his stake.

It is still not clear how Malvinder will handle group company stakes in Religare and Fortis Hospitals held by Rfanbaxy Labs.