Firms slipping in red outnumber those in profit

While the current earnings season has brought good fortune for a large number of firms by way of their return to profitability, a larger number went into the reverse gear and plunged into the red in this quarter.

A total of 112 companies have posted turnaround results for the January-March quarter, marking their return to profit from a net loss in the previous quarter.

This includes 25 firms having been in the red for four consecutive quarters. However, as many as 170 companies have reported net losses for the same quarter, as against their net profit after tax in the previous quarter.

This includes 61 firms that were reporting net profit for the past four consecutive quarters. While a total of 1,231 companies have so far reported a net profit for the quarter, there have been as many as 435 companies witnessing net losses for the same quarter.

The companies that saw their quarterly figures dipping into the red from profitability in the previous quarter include firms like Development Credit Bank, Deccan Aviation, DCM Shriram Industries, EID Parry, Kinetic Engineering, Mid-Day

Multimedia, Sandesh, Shopper's Stop and Tech Mahindra. On positive front, most of the turnaround results in the latest quarter are from small-cap and mid-cap firms.

However, they also include a large number of firms owned by domestic corporate giants or Indian subsidiaries of some global majors. The companies that reported positive profit after tax figures, after losses in the previous quarter, include Tata group's Tata Metalliks, Mahindra Composites, Nandas' promoted Escorts Ltd and mobile service provider Shyam Telecom.

The turnaround stories of the January-March quarter also include the Indian subsidiaries of Korean consumer goods major Whirlpool, German consumer goods maker Henkel and US auto parts major Federal Mogul.