Reliance Industries plans to double its PET recycling capacity by setting up a recycled PSF manufacturing facility in the state of Andhra Pradesh. This is in line with the endeavour of Reliance to improves upon its
sustainability quotient. The operation will be handled by Srichakra Ecotex, which will build and operate the facility exclusively for RIL. This is part of its plan to more than double its recycling capacity to 5 billion PET bottles to maintain 90% recycling rate. This is likely to make the legacy business more sustainable.
Hindustan Petroleum reported 11.04% lower net profit at Rs.2,004 crore for the Jun-21 quarter. Revenues for the quarter were sharply higher at Rs.77,980 crore. Total sales volumes increased yoy from 7.62 MT to 8.83 MT in the Jun-21 quarter. Sales growth has been robust despite the pressure from COVID 2.0. For the quarter, sale of petrol was up 36.6%, diesel 22.2% and ATF 118.8%. The gross refining margins or GRM worked out to $3.31/bbl. HPCL expects Brent crude to stay in the range of $70-75/bbl for this fiscal.
Kumar Mangalam Birla has officially stepped down as the non-executive chairman of the Board of Vodafone Idea. This comes exactly a day after Mr. Birla had indicated that he would be willing to transfer his 27% stake in Vodafone Idea to the government or any government sponsored financial institution to save the company from collapse the protect jobs an livelihoods. Government is already considering taking over Vodafone Idea and syndicate a buyout or even a PE deal. VI has AGR outstanding of Rs.50,000 crore.
Titan reported a net profit of Rs.18 crore in the Jun-21 quarter as against a net loss of Rs.297 crore in the Jun-20 quarter. Total Income was up nearly 75% at Rs.3,519 crore, but that was largely on a small base. In the Jun-21 quarter, the second wave of the pandemic had severely disrupted business. Titan has confirmed that its jewellery division was gaining good traction in new customers and its customer base had touched pre-pandemic levels. Revenues of jewellery division more than doubled to Rs.2,467 crore.
India’s government owned refiners like IOCL and BPCL plan to invest Rs.200,000 crore or $27 billion to boost oil refining capacity by 20% by 2025. Currently, India has refining capacity of 249 million tonnes a year, equivalent to 5 million bpd. By 2025, this refining capacity is expected to increase to 298 million tonnes. IOCL will expand its refining capacity from 70 MTPA to 87.55 MTPA by 2025. IOCL will also double its petchem capacity to 6.3 MTPA. Other refiners like BPCL and HCPL are also boosting their capacities.
Nuvoco Vistas, part of Nirma Group, set the price band for its Rs.5,000 crore IPO at Rs.560-570 per share. The IPO will open for subscription on 09-Aug and close on 11-Aug. The IPO will comprise of fresh issue of shares worth Rs.1,500 crore and an OFS for Rs.3,500 crore. Nuvoco will use the funds to repay some of its high cost loans. Nuvoco Vistas was formed in 1999, but recently it took over Lafarge India and the cement division of Emami to take its cement capacity to 22.3 MT, the fifth largest cement making capacity in India.
IIFL Wealth Management stock surged 14% to touch Rs.1,580 after the company reported a 42% rise in PAT a Rs.119 crore. Apart from the strong operational performance, the markets were also enthused by the special dividend of Rs.35 per share announced by IIFL Wealth. Overall revenues from operations were up 7% at Rs.283 crore. As of Jun-21, the AUM grew 15% to Rs.282,000 crore. During the quarter, IIFLW reported strong inflows of Rs.14,300 crore including corporate treasury inflows worth Rs.5,200 crore.
The Ministry of Civil Aviation confirmed that Air India had accumulated losses of Rs.70,820 crore since its merger with Indian Airlines in 2007. Some of the reasons for this huge loss were high interest burden on debt, tough competition from low-cost carriers, high fuel cost and the impact of exchange rate variations. Currently, Air India is in the midst of the proposed sale with the Tatas among the front runners for the Air India sale. One challenge to privatization is that liabilities are expected to cross $20 billion by 2025.