Coal India net profit up 4.21% in Q3

Coal India on Saturday reported a 4.21 per cent rise in its consolidated net profit to Rs 3,004.79 crore during the quarter ended December 31, 2017, as compared to Rs 2,883.27 crore in the year-ago period.

Its revenue from operations during the quarter under review was at Rs 21,643.28 crore, down by 1.6 per cent from Rs 22,000.79 crore in the corresponding quarter of 2016-17.

The state miner said its total expenses during the December quarter stood at Rs 17,873.93 crore, down by 5.4 per cent from Rs 18,907.17 crore in the same quarter of previous fiscal.

Post applicability of Goods and Services tax from July 1, 2017, revenue from operations are disclosed net of GST, and accordingly, the revenue from operations and total expenses for the quarter are not comparable with the previous periods, it said.

However, it reported that its employee benefit expense in the third quarter of the current fiscal increased by 6.3 per cent to Rs 8,753.21 crore as compared to Rs 8,231.79 crore in the corresponding period of the previous fiscal.

In a filing to the stock exchanges, it said the employee benefit expenses for the quarter includes an adhoc provision of Rs 67.79 crore towards pay revision of the executive employees.

After a long negotiation, Coal India management and workers` unions, in last October, had signed the wage agreement for non-executive employees and this would be effective for five years till June 30, 2021.

The miner had said the wage hike would have an estimated average annual impact of Rs 5,667 crore.

During the three months ended December 31, its tax expense was at Rs 1,605.19 crore as against Rs 1,274.21 crore in the corresponding three months of previous fiscal.

It produced 152.04 million tonnes during October to December period of the current fiscal as compared to 147.73 million tonnes in the corresponding period of previous fiscal and its off-take during the period was at 152.43 million tonnes as against 142.67 million tonnes in the year-ago period.

The miner also said, during the December quarter, it sold 121.87 million tonnes of raw coal through the fuel supply agreement route with an average realisation of Rs 1,182 per tonne and clocked net sales of Rs 14,400 crore in this route.

However, it sold 26.37 million tonnes of raw coal in the third quarter of current fiscal through e-auction with an average realisation of Rs 1,998 crore per tonne and net sales in e-auction stood at Rs 5,268 crore.

It had recently said it supplied 371.8 million tonnes of coal to power sector and 103.1 million tonnes coal to non-power sector in 2017-18 till January, 2018, recording a growth of 6.8 per cent in power sector and 8.8 per cent in non-power sector dispatch, as against 348.1 million tonnes and 94.8 million tonnes respectively in the same period last year.

It also said a level of 14.5 million tonnes coal stock at power house was recorded on February 5, 2018 as compared to 8.5 million tonnes on September 30, 2017.