RCF pares down trading volumes to offset Rupee blow

The current bout of misery for the rupee has forced Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilisers (RCF), India’s biggest public sector fertiliser company, to cut down on its trading volumes in an attempt to rein in losses.

Trading in itself does not spell losses for the company. But since most of the traded quantity is through imported fertilisers, it has seen its notional mark-to-market (MTM) losses shoot up in the first of the current fiscal.

This in effect has made the fertiliser manufacturer go slow on imports, which means a scale-down in its trading volumes as well. The company’s trading mostly involves its product imports, which range from di-ammonium phosphate (DAP) to various grades of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium-based fertilisers, collectively called NPK.

R G Rajan, chairman and managing director, RCF, said trading contributed up to 10-15% of its overall revenues of Rs 7,100 approximately in 2012-13. While the company is looking at various sources of raw materials overseas, no major fresh imports will be effected this year, he clarified while talking to dna.

Gautam Sen, the firm’s finance head, revealed that RCF has imported only one shipment of DAP this year. If the rupee stays sticky, this will be the only traded quantity that will take the import route, besides urea.