For the June quarter, Praj Industries revenue declined by 8% from last year to ₹640.2 crore, while its Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortisation (EBITDA) fell 66% on a year-on-year basis.
EBITDA margin declined to low-single-digit, to 4.9% during the June quarter, from 13.2% last year. Net profit for the company was nearly wiped out, declining 94% to ₹5.33 crore. The drop also appears exaggerated as the company had an exceptional gain of ₹28.15 crore in the base quarter due to the sale of land in Nasarapur.Praj Industries highlighted that its domestic ethanol business witnessed delayed execution cycles and liquidity crunch at the end of the customers, and delayed execution of a couple of high value engineering orders at Kandla, led to higher labour and infrastructure expenses.
Order intake during the quarter declined by 10.5% from last year to ₹795 crore, while order backlog increased 10% to ₹4,448 crore from ₹4,044 crore last year.
Out of the nine analysts that have coverage on Praj Industries, eight of them have a “buy” rating, while the other one has a “hold” recommendation.
Shares of Praj Industries are currently trading 6.9% lower at ₹414. The stock has declined 16% in the last one month, while this is likely to be the first negative return that the stock may deliver after 2019. The stock gained 12.6% in 2020, 190% in 2021, 6.3% in 2022, 56% in 2023 and 48% last year.
