SAIL net down 12% to Rs 1,177 crore

State-run Steel Authority of India (SAIL) today registered an 11.5 per cent fall in first-quarter net profit at Rs 1,177 crore due to higher input costs, lower sales and increased cost on employees. In the year-ago period, the country’s largest steelmaker had posted a net profit of Rs 1,330.43 crore.

“The impact was mainly due to rise in the prices of coking coal, which rose to $368 per tonne in the first quarter of this year compared to last year, when it was hovering around $110-$115 per tonne.

Moreover, this quarter, the impact was also felt due to the performance-related pay to our employees for the last three years, payable since 2007, which amounted to Rs 932 crore,” C S Verma, chairman of SAIL, told Business Standard.

Net sales declined to Rs 9,133.32 crore from Rs 9,163.41 crore in the same quarter last year. According to Verma, the dip in sales was due to slackening demand. However, average sales realisation went up to Rs 34,000 a tonne, compared to Rs 31,000 a tonne last year.

During the quarter, SAIL plants produced 1.18 million tonnes of special and value-added products, a rise of three per cent over the same quarter last year.