Essar Ports reported over 15 percent increase in consolidated net profit at Rs 104.6 crore for the quarter ended March 31, 2015. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 90.8 crore in the same period last year, it said in the BSE filing said. Total revenue of the company declined to Rs 413.21 crore during the fourth quarter of the 2014-15 from Rs 663.27 crore in the same period in the corresponding year. The fourth quarter revenue slipped as there was no sale of traded goods and much of the income was generated from ports and terminal services in the said period.
The company’s expenses declined to Rs 112.46 crore from Rs 431.33 crore in the said period. Commenting on the performance, Essar Ports Managing Director Rajiv Agarwal said: “The company has delivered another quarter of consistent growth in financial performance.
“The emphasis is on development of world class facilities and to complete the projects in hand in time. The company has now received all pending approvals related to environment and land clearances,” he added. Essar Ports, with a current capacity of 120 million tonnes per annum (MTPA), is aiming to expand to 194 MTPA over the next few years.
The company is setting up a dry bulk terminal at Salaya in Gujarat with a capacity of 20 MMTPA. It plans to expand its Hazira port capacity by 20 MMTPA and develop a coal terminal of 18 MMTPA capacity at Paradip in Odisha. The company has four operational port terminals at Hazira and Vadinar in Gujarat, Paradip, and Vizag in Andhra Pradesh.
