For the first time after 15 quarters, the aggregate net profit of 1,092 companies has turned negative. Earlier in the December 2001 quarter, these companies had posted 13 per cent decline in their bottomline.
Net profits of these 1,092 companies declined by 7.45 per cent to Rs 18,232 crore in the December quarter compared with Rs 19,699 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous year.
If one excludes the refineries from the sample, the remaining 1,088 firms have reported 22 per cent rise in net profit to Rs 18,623.16 crore against Rs 15,318.17 crore in the previous comparable quarter.
The refinery sector has posted a first time aggregate net loss of Rs 323.58 crore during the quarter (Rs 4,558.36 crore). BPCL and HPCL, both have reported a net loss of over Rs 1,000 crore each in the period.
Profit margin has also declined due to subdued performance by the refineries.
Net profit margins (NPM) of the 1,092 firms declined from 8.3 per cent to 6.52 per cent in the quarter. Operating profit margins (OPM) declined to 13.56 per cent from 16.4 per cent and gross profit margins to 11.71 per cent (14.54 per cent) during the quarter.
Apart from refineries and oil & gas sector, domestic white goods appliances and automobiles (heavy vehicles) sector turned into red during the quarter, while steel composite/ alloys, tea & coffee, bearings, auto ancillaries, specialty chemicals reported decline in their net profit.
However, cement, power cables, print media, steel alloys including HRR firms, paints, housing constructions and cement products companies posted over 100 per cent growth in their bottomline.
Hotels, non-ferrous metals, cotton textiles, oil drilling firms, engineering & civil construction sectors have reported a bottomline growth between 50-100 per cent during the quarter.