BHEL 08/09 net up 6 pct, sees strong orders
Bharat Heavy Electricals on Thursday reported a lower-than-expected 6 percent provisional rise in profit for 2008/09, and remained upbeat on future orders despite the economic slowdown.
State-run BHEL, India’s top power equipment maker, said it had 1.17 trillion rupees ($23 billion) of orders on its books as at March 31, the end of the 2008/09 fiscal year.
Chairman K. Ravi Kumar expected about 500 billion rupees of new orders during 2009/10, which he said would help BHEL achieve sales growth of 20-25 percent.
“We have enough orders. I don’t think there will be any slowdown as far as the company is concerned,” he told reporters.
India’s economic growth for 2008/09 will print below 7 percent, and a similar growth rate was expected in 2009/10, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Wednesday. The economy had grown at or above 9 percent for the previous three fiscal years.
BHEL said its provisional net profit for 2008/09 rose 6.3 percent to 30.39 billion rupees from 28.59 billion, with revenue rising 28.5 percent to 275.05 billion rupees from 214.01 billion.
Analysts polled by Reuters Estimates had expected net profit of 31.56 billion rupees on revenue of 253.2 billion rupees.
Provisions of 17.28 billion rupees for a pending wage rise backdated to January 2007 had weighed on profit, but Kumar said with normal wage growth expected this year he hoped net profit would to rise.
“Profit will go up because we have provided everything this year,” he said.
BHEL will invest 10 billion rupees to expand a plant in north India for a forging venture with the UK’s Sheffield Forgemasters, Kumar said, adding the company was also talking to a couple of firms from Europe and Japan for a possible transmission venture.
Shares in BHEL, which has a market value of nearly $15 billion, rose 4.1 percent to 1,531.85 rupees in a Mumbai market that gained 4.5 percent. The shares have risen 12.4 percent this year, compared with a 7.3 percent rise in the broader market.
Source Courtesy From - DPA - ANI - earthtimes.org -
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