Vedanta Q1 profit surges 6% to ₹5,592 cr; revenue up 36%

Oil & gas and metals company Vedanta Ltd. has reported a 6% year-on-year rise in its net profit to ₹5,592 crore for the April-June quarter on robust operating performance across key businesses. Vedanta's profit during the same quarter last year stood at ₹4,224 crore. The Anil Agarwal-led company's revenue from operations surged 36% YoY to ₹38,251 crore, supported by higher sales volume, commodity prices and strategic hedging gains.

Vedanta says its EBITDA stood at ₹10,741 crore during the June quarter, which grew 7% YoY and was its best ever Q1 EBITDA performance.

Vedanta's EBITDA margin rose 32% during the first quarter of the financial year. During the first quarter, Vedanta's gross debt, however, increased by ₹8,031 crore to ₹61,140 crore as of June 30, 2022.

In Q1, Vedanta declared a dividend of ₹31.50 per share in April 2022 and ₹19.50 per share in July 2022, totalling a dividend yield of 15.4% in FY23 so far.

Sunil Duggal, chief executive officer, Vedanta, says despite inflationary cost pressures, the company started FY23 with strong performance. "This year, our key priorities will be delivery on committed volumes, timely execution of projects, value addition, vertical integration, cost reduction and proactive commodity price risk management". Duggal says women in decision-making bodies in the company rose to 29% in Q1 FY23.

The earnings per share for Q1 FY23 was at ₹11.92 per share compared to ₹11.40 per share in Q1 FY22.

In terms of operational performance, Vedanta's aluminium production rose 3% YoY to 565kt, while the alumina production rose 1% YoY to 485kt. Mined metal production rose 14% YoY to 252kt, and the company recorded metal in concentrate production at Gamsberg of 53kt, up 14%YoY.

However, in oil and gas, the average gross operated production declined 10% YoY to 148 kboepd (thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day) on the natural decline. The company's production of saleable ore in Karnataka also declined 14% YoY to 1.26 million tonnes, while saleable steel production was also down 7% to 269 kt.

Its subsidiary Vedanta Resources Ltd. has operations in oil & gas, zinc, lead, silver, copper, iron ore, steel, and aluminium & power across India, South Africa and Namibia. The company claims to have pledged $5 billion over the next 10 years to accelerate the transition to net zero operations.

Ahead of the quarterly results, Vedanta Ltd. shares closed 0.80% up at Rs 245.5 on the BSE today. The stock has been gaining for the last two days and has risen 1.74% in returns in the period. It is trading higher than 20-day moving averages but lower than 5-day, 50-day, 100-day and 200-day moving averages.