L&T Q3FY22 PAT dips 17 pc

The company reported a PAT of Rs 2466.71 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal.

Its revenue from operations for the quarter under review grew 11 percent to Rs 39562.92 crore from Rs 35596.42 crore

in Q3 FY2021. L&T Group Chief Financial Officer R Shankar Raman told the media that the profit reported in Q3 of last fiscal had an instance of gain on divestment from discontinued operations of the Electrical & Automation business as well as the sale of commercial property in realty business.

"Also, last year, we raised a lot of money from the market not knowing how the Covid pandemic will play out and how scarce the liquidity will become. But we did not spend the money and instead invested it in the market. This investment was earning us money which is reflected in other income of the last quarter," he said.

Raman further said that since the company did not require the funds, they repaid the debt that was raised.

During the quarter, the company reduced its overall debt at the group level by nearly Rs 10,000 crore.

In the December quarter, the company bagged orders worth Rs 50,359 crore, registering decline of 31 percent over the corresponding period of the previous year.

The company has attributed the decline to the benefit it received from securing the biggest ever EPC contract for Mumbai Ahmedabad High Speed Rail in the infrastructure segment.

During the quarter, orders were received in various businesses including hydrocarbon offshore, metros, rural water supply, minerals and metal, public space, health infrastructure and power transmission and distribution.

The International orders at Rs 20,521 crore during the quarter comprised 41 percent of the total order inflow, with receipt of large value international orders in hydrocarbon offshore.

The consolidated order book of the group stood at Rs 340,365 crore as on December 31, 2021, at record levels, with international orders having a share of 24 percent, the company said.

According to Raman, nearly Rs 4 lakh crore worth of project awards is in the pipeline and nearly 70 percent of these are expected to flow from the infra segment.

"There the investments happening in transport infrastructure and water, as well as building data centres, public healthcare, etc. This (pipeline) is looking promising. It is just a question of timing. From our end, what we can do is position ourselves competitively and respond to these bids that come to out and how to maintain the strike rate of 15-20 percent that we have been doing historically," he said.

Noting that nearly 50 percent of the capex planned by the central PSUs and around 60 percent of capex planned by the state governments is still unconsumed, Raman said, "there is a lot of headroom. Usually Q4 is a bulky quarter as the state governments and Centre PSUs exhaust their budget. We look at the current quarter with optimism and we are trying to stay as close to the guidance of low to mid teens."

On the outlook, the company said, "In the backdrop of the current economic environment, the company continues its planned path of winning targeted orders, focus on profitable execution of its large order book, leverage the strong growth momentum in its IT & TS portfolio and along with many other value enhancing measures, is committed to create sustainable long term returns to its stakeholders."