Bharti Airtel reported 54% higher net profits for Q3FY24 at Rs2,442 crore. The profit growth was driven by strong 4G and 5G customer additions. In terms of top live revenues, it was up 5.85% for the quarter at Rs37,899 crore. However, sequential growth in revenues was just about 2.3%. Average revenue per user (ARPU) increased 7.7% in Q3FY24 to Rs208. This ARPU is sharply higher than Jio at Rs181.70 and Vodafone Idea at Rs145. EBITDA for the quarter stood at Rs20,044 crore with EBITDA margins up by 94 bps at 53.9%.
For FY25, the IPO pipeline is already robust with nearly Rs72,000 crore worth of IPOs ready to hit the primary market. Nearly 25 companies have got SEBI approval to raise Rs27,190 crore and 41 companies are waiting SEBI nod to raise Rs45,576 crore. While election uncertainty remains, the big ticket IPOs this year include OYO (Rs 8,430 crore), EBIX Cash (R 6,000 crore), NSDL (Rs 4,500 crore), and First Cry (Rs 4,000 crore). Kotak expects 15-20 unicorns to go public in next 2 years creating more than 10 decacorns by 2025.
Ashok Leyland Ltd reported 73% rise in net profits for Q3FY24 at Rs608.85 crore driven by high volume in commercial vehicles (CV). Revenues of the company also grew by 7% yoy at Rs11,092 crore, while the EBITDA was also higher by 39.77% at Rs1,114 crore. CV volumes touched a record high of 138,416 units in first nine months of FY24. During the quarter the company got orders for more than 3,800 buses from State Transport Undertakings. The impact of tepid rural demand has not been too acute on Ashok Leyland.
India’s crude oil imports from Russia fell in January to its lowest level in 12 months. However, at 1.2 million barrels, Rusia still remains India’s biggest oil supplier. Oil supplies from Russia had peaked at 1.62 million barrels in November 2023. India imports 4.91 million barrels of oil a day, with Russia accounting for 25% of these supplies. Recently, India has again increased its reliance on Iraq and Saudi Arabia; two of India’s traditional favourites. In December 2021, Russia was a marginal player with 2% share, but now is at 25%.
Vanguard has cut the fair value of ANI Technologies, parent of Ola, for the third time in a row. Now Ola is valued at just $1.9 billion compared to peak valuations of $7.3 billion during the last round of fund raising in December 2021. Incidentally, Vanguard holds 166,185 shares of ANI Technologies, which accounts for 0.7% stake in Ola Cabs. Ironically, the series of markdowns have come at a time when Ola Cabs narrowed its net loss. However, the crisis at Byju’s and Paytm has taken much of the sheen away from digital plays.
India’s services PMI expanded sharply in January due to robust domestic and external demand. The Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) Services climbed to a 6-month high of 61.8 in Jan-24 from 59.0 in Dec-23. The services PMI measures changes in services activity. Generally, a reading of more than 50 denotes expansion in services activity, while a reading below 50 indicative of contraction. For January 2024, the new business expanded at a faster pace and new export orders also added on to boost the PMI Services.
The Q3FY24 quarter continues to be challenging for the Rs5 trillion FMCG industry. Festive spends were muted and general traders were feeling the pinch of lower consumer offtake. Even in the portfolio of the FMCG companies in the quarter, food and beverages have still done well. The pressure is on the demand for toiletries, and home care products. Poll related spending is likely to boost FMCG demand in the next two quarters. Players like Marico believe that rural FMCG market will revive on the back of lower inflation. IOCL, BPCL and HPCL are reported combined net profit of Rs69,000 crore for the first 9 months of FY24. Oil retailers have resisted calls to revert to daily price revision and pass on softening in rates to consumers. That has helped them to boost profits. This was largely because the price of international crude has fallen sharply while the market prices are still static. The government has already withdrawn capital infusion for OMCs in FY25. In H1FY24, the operating of the 3 OMCs combined stood at an impressive Rs90,000 crore.