Higher sales growth, profits marked companies performance in Q2: RBI

Raw material expenses increased in this quarter

Net profit of listed private sector companies recorded a robust growth of 16 per cent in the second quarter of the fiscal compared to 11.2 per cent in the previous quarter, the Reserve Bank said on Wednesday.

Among the sectors, manufacturing continued to record high net profit growth, whereas services (Non-IT) sector continued to witness contraction in net profits but at a much lower rate.

"Aggregate sales growth (Y-o-Y) of the listed non-government non-financial (NGNF) companies grew by 1.9 per cent in Q2 2016-17, after near stagnation in Q1 2016-17," the RBI said.

However, raw material expenses increased in the quarter in line with the general pause in falling global commodity prices.

"This resulted in a deceleration of operating profit growth at the aggregate level," it said.

The data is based on abridged financial results of 2,702 listed non-government non-financial companies for second quarter of 2016-17.

The central bank further said interest expenses remained unchanged in the second quarter which helped in a robust growth of 16 per cent in net profits at the aggregate level.

Sales growth improved significantly (3.7 per cent) for the manufacturing sector after contraction in the previous quarter. However, sales of the services (Non-IT) sector continued to contract and IT sector witnessed deceleration of sales growth.

At the aggregate level and in the manufacturing sector, raw material expenses increased after contraction in the previous seven quarters. Rate of staff cost increased in the manufacturing and services (Non-IT) sector and slightly moderated for the IT sector.

According to the RBI, operating profit decelerated to 5.5 per cent in Q2 from 9.6 per cent in the previous quarter.

Growth in operating profits in July-September quarter moderated across all sectors with significant deceleration for the IT sector.

Pricing power measured by net profit margin increased significantly.