Mumbai: JSW Steel Ltd, part of the energy-to-steel JSW Group, on Friday reported a 56% drop in its fiscal third quarter net profit from a year earlier, hurt by a significant foreign exchange loss because of sharp a depreciation in the rupee against the dollar.
Sajjan Jindal, chairman, JSW Steel.
Net profit for the October-December period fell to Rs 168.24 crore from Rs 382.30 crore in the year-earlier period, the company said in an exchange filing.
Net sales for the quarter rose 36% to Rs 7,589.62 crore from Rs 5,771.42 crore a year earlier.
The earnings were below market expectations. A Bloomberg poll of 16 analysts had tipped net profit at Rs 348.5 crore on net sales of Rs 9,258.7 crore.
The company’s shares fell 2.9% to Rs 647.70 at 3:30 pm, underperforming the 0.5% gain in the benchmark Sensex.
The company reported a foreign exchange loss of Rs 500.11 crore for the quarter, during which the local currecy lost 7.7% against the dollar.