L&T sees profits drop 27 percent

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Industrial group Larsen & Toubro reported a 27 percent dip in net profit for the three months to end of March, as a fall in oil prices and challenges in some international projects hurt business.

The company posted a profit of 20.7 billion Indian rupees ($324.79 million) for its fiscal fourth quarter, compared with the 28.4 billion it had posted in the same quarter last year.

L&T, whose performance is seen as a gauge of the health of the Indian economy, has disappointed investors in recent quarters with a cautious take on the outlook for domestic demand for its engineering, construction and manufacturing goods.

 

($1 = 63.7332 rupees)

(Reporting by Tommy Wilkes in NEW DELHI and Nivedita Bhattacharjee in MUMBAI; Editing by Catherine Evans)