Nalco posts Rs 235 cr profit in 2nd quarter

Bhubaneswar, Nov 11 :  The National Aluminium Company Limited (Nalco) has achieved a net profit of Rs 235 crore for the second quarter in the financial year 2017-18, said a statement on Saturday.

According to the reviewed financial results for the second quarter taken on record by the Board in the meeting held here on Saturday, Nalco has achieved net profit of Rs 235 crore as against Rs 129 crore in the preceding quarter registering 82 per cent growth and Rs 121 crore in the corresponding quarter of previous fiscal (94 per cent growth).

The operating profit of the second quarter has raised 102 per cent over the first quarter of financial year 2017-18, the statement said.

The net sales in the second quarter was Rs 2,420 crore compared to Rs 1,695 crore in the corresponding quarter of last year.

"The market harvesting in alumina segment and focus on cost reduction have helped us improve our profitability. When the global metal market was in the slump cycle, Nalco maintained its resilience and faced the international downturn with courage by ramping up production," said Nalco CMD Tapan Kumar Chand.

With the shift of the market now towards the upbeat cycle, the decision to remain brave and continue the operations with high productivity and investments has paid off well for the company. The recent financial performance of the Navratna PSU is a testimony to this, Chand added.

The net profit and gross sales turnover for the half year ended September 2017 works out to Rs 364 crore and Rs 4,179 crore respectively, as against the corresponding figures of Rs 256 crore and Rs 3,224 crore achieved during the first six months of the previous financial year.

On the production front, Nalco has put up an impressive performance in the first half of 2017-18 fiscal. During the period, bauxite mining was at 37.06 lakh tones while alumina hydrate production was 10.35 lakh tones.

During the period, the company produced 2.06 lakh tonnes of aluminium, which is 10.25 per cent higher than the production of the corresponding period of fiscal year 2016-17.

Nalco's net power generation has also gone up by 11.73 per cent at 3,290 million units as compared to the corresponding period of the previous fiscal. The company also generated 262.90 million units of wind power registering an increase of 28.5 per cent as compared to the corresponding figure of the previous fiscal.

Nalco's alumina hydrate sales, during the first half, was up 9.98 per cent at 6.39 lakh tonnes as compared to the first six months of 2016-17. During the period, the company sold 2.02 lakh tonnes of aluminium, which is up 14.19 per cent compared to the corresponding period of the previous fiscal.