ONGC Q1 net up 14% at Rs 5,459 crore

Net realisation on crude rose 25% to $ 58.92 per barrel

Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), state-owned and largest petroleum explorer, posted a 14 per cent rise in net profit to Rs 5,459 crore for the quarter ended June from a year before, on improved realisations and lower sharing of subsidy burden.

“The price of crude oil was healthy during the quarter. Also, around 28 per cent of the total liquid products were sold at an industrial (market-driven) price. The subsidy impact has also come down,” chairman and managing director D K Sarraf said.

Net realisation on crude oil rose 25 per cent to $58.92 a barrel in the three months ended June from $47.15 a barrel in the corresponding quarter last year. The company had to share the burden of under-recoveries of oil marketing companies (OMCs) to the extent of Rs 1,133 crore, against Rs 13,200 crore in the same quarter of 2014-15.

“The discount of Rs 1,133 crore offered to OMCs in lieu of subsidy burden sharing impacted profits by Rs 628 crore. This is compared to an impact of Rs 7,396 in the year-ago period,” Sarraf said.

Total income of the company dipped by a marginal 0.5 per cent to Rs 22,631 crore in the June quarter from Rs 22,746 crore in the same quarter last fiscal. ONGC's crude oil production rose by a mere 1.3 per cent to 6.136 million tonne while natural gas production increased 3.6 per cent to 5.818 billion cubic meter.

ONGC notified four new discoveries during the quarter including Gojalia in Gojalia PML in South Tripura district, Komarada 3 in Tatipaka-Pasarlapudi PML in KG basin, and two discoveries in the KG-DWN-98/2 and KG-OSN-2004/1 blocks. The company's board also approved an investment of Rs 2,818 crore to produce incremental oil and gas in Neelam block apart from submitting draft Field Development Plan (FDP) for KG basin block KG-DWN-98/2 to the regulator for approval.

ONGC's share price at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today closed at Rs 269.80, down 0.2 per cent as compared to previous close.