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| Edited By: |Source: Reuters |Updated: Mar 17, 2018, 04:43 AM IST
Steel pipemaker Jindal Saw Ltd will see increased competition and slower order flow, compressing its margin for the rest of this fiscal, a top official said on Monday.
The margin for the next three quarters will be about Rs11,000 a tonne from the current Rs12,000 a tonne, managing director Indresh Batra told analysts on a conference call.
"Market is under pressure in all segments because of increase in competition and lower capacity utilisation," Vinay Gupta, vice-president (finance), said, adding that there was pressure on new orders, mainly from the oil and gas segments in India and overseas.
Despite a difficult environment, the company expects to meet the earlier announced guidance of 900,000-1 million tonnes of output in financial year 2010-11, Gupta said.
Jindal Saw's current order book stands at $700 million, which will be executable by March 2011, Gupta said, adding that 55% of the orders were for export.
The company plans to spend about Rs400 crore in the next 12-15 months to set up plants in India and Abu Dhabi, the plans for which were announced earlier.
Earlier in the day, Jindal Saw reported an 11% increase in net profit to Rs149 crore for the quarter ended June. Revenue for the period fell 24% to Rs1,135 crore on lower raw material prices, Gupta said.
Shares in Jindal Saw, which the market values at about Rs5,500 crore, closed down 0.12% at Rs202.25 in a flat Mumbai market.
