ONGC PAT triples while HPCL clocks highest annual profit

Mumbai: Oil & Natural Gas Corporation on Thursday announced a major spurt in profit for its fourth quarter. The company reported over 300 percent growth in profit for the quarter ending March 31, 2021. PAT is reported at Rs 6,734 crores as against Rs 3,214 crores in previous fiscal.

Crude production levels were down by 4.6 percent in the quarter. 5.551 MMT Crude was produced in the Mar’21 quarter as opposed to 5.819 MMT in previous quarter.

Production of Natural Gas (Consolidated) was down by 7.6 percent and has been attributed to lack of uptake from customers owing to Covid-19.

The board during its 339th meeting observed that “ONGC has almost reached last year’s production levels in case of Crude oil from its operated blocks.”

The board also reported 10 new discoveries for the fiscal besides declaring a dividend of Rs 1.85 per share of face value of Rs 5 each. The dividend declaration is subject to approvals from members at the AGM.

Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited, a subsidiary of ONGC has reported a dream-run. It has reported highest ever profit of Rs. 10,664 crores on standalone basis during the FY’21, as against profit of Rs. 2,637 crores during FY’20.

HPCL commissioned 2,158 new retail outlets which is the highest in a year taking the number of total retail outlets to 18,634. HPCL also commissioned 112 new LPG distributorships taking number of total LPG distributors to 6,192 as of 31st March, 2021.

HPCL reported capacity utilization of 104%; sales of 36.59 MMT compared to 39.64 MMT last fiscal;

The spurt in profitability is attributed to robust operational performance, improvement in refinery margins, inventory gains and favorable exchange rate variations. The management observed that the combined GRM (Gross Revenue Margin) for HPCL Refineries for FY20-21 worked out to $3.86 per barrel as opposed to $1.02 barrel in the corresponding previous year.

HPCL has proposed dividends of Rs 22.75 per share.

For the fiscal year ending March 31 2021. While the turnover for FY21 is down to Rs 3.60 lakh crores from Rs 4.24 lakh crores in previous fiscal but consolidated net profit has doubled. ONGC’s Consolidated Group Net Profit (PAT) stands at Rs 21,343 Crore for FY21 as against Rs. 11,456 Crore in FY20.

In 2018, ONGC acquired HPCL for Rs 36,915 crores. The Mangalore Refinery, meanwhile, reported loss after tax of Rs. 240 crore in FY’21 as against loss after tax of Rs. 2,740 crore in FY’20. The drop in profit has been attributed to a decrease in sales output.