IOC net doubles to over Rs10,000 cr despite lower sales

Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOC), the country's largest oil retailer, has posted a 100 per cent jump in its annual net profit at Rs10,399.03 crore for the 2015-16 fiscal, against Rs5,273.03 crore in FY15.

This despite a 19.86 per cent fall in its total income from operations to Rs3,50,603.09 crore in FY16 from Rs4,37,524.23 crore in FY15.

The company also saw an 80.3 per cent drop in its fourth quarter net profit at Rs1,235.64 crore for FY 2016 against Rs6,285.35 crore in January-March 2015.

IOC, which emerged as the second-most profitable public sector undertaking after oil explorer Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), attributed the profit surge to reduction in inventory and better management.

With a net profit of Rs10,399.03 crore for fiscal ended 31 March 2016, IOC was second only to Oil and Natural Gas Corp, which reported a net profit of Rs16,004 crore in 2015-16 fiscal.

''We had an outstanding year with record profits. A few significant things have contributed to this – our physical performance has improved, the company has cut down its costs and inventory losses have been less. The inventory loss has also came down from Rs17,000 crore from previous year to Rs9,000 crore,'' IOC chairman B Ashok said.

''The fourth quarter net profit was down because it incurred an inventory loss of Rs3,335 crore in the fourth quarter of FY16 against Rs871 crore in the same quarter last year. It impacted its net profit by Rs2,464 crore. At the same time, it booked about Rs1,494 crore of impairment losses,'' he said.

The company had reported the highest profit of Rs10,200 crore in 2009-10 when crude prices were at peak. The government-owned company has reported a gross refining margin of $5.06/barrel in FY16 against $0.27 / barrel in FY15.

The inventory losses in FY16 were down 45.39 per cent at Rs9,731 crore against Rs17,822 crore in FY15. The company sold 5.49 per cent more petroleum products in FY16 at 80.7 million tonnes in FY16 against 76.5 million tonnes in FY15.

In FY16, IOC's refinery throughput stood at 56.694 million tonnes and its pipeline network carried 79.824 million tonnes of crude oil and products.

HPCL Q4 net drops 28 per cent to Rs1,553 cr

Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) has reported a 28 per cent drop in its fourth quarter net profit on provisioning for higher rentals and foreign exchange losses.

The net profit of Rs1,552.94 crore in January-March 2016 was 28.18 per cent lower than Rs2,162.39 crore during the corresponding period last year.

''The profit was lower as the company provisioned Rs215 crore for rise in lease rental by the Delhi government,'' M K Surana, chairman and managing director of HPCL, said.