NCC aims 20% growth in FY24 topline on strong order book
Informist, Tuesday, May 30, 2023
--NCC official: Expect FY24 net profit to grow 35% on year
--FY24 revenue growth aim backed by robust order book
--Plan to secure new orders worth 250 bln rupees FY24
--Order book execution to aid FY24 revenue, profit aim
--FY24 EBITDA margins seen similar to FY23
--Low input costs to aid EBITDA margin boost FY24
By Narayana Krishna
HYDERABAD - Infrastructure developer NCC Ltd is aiming to clock 20% year-on-year growth in its revenue for the current financial year ending March, aided by a robust order book and strong order execution, K. Vijay Kumar, the company's vice president-finance, told Informist.
The company expects a 50-basis-point on-year improvement in its net profit margin for 2023-24 (Apr-Mar), while the bottomline is expected to grow 35% on year, the NCC official said.
For 2022-23, NCC had reported a 16% on-year growth in its net profit at 5.69 bln rupees on a revenue of 133.51 bln rupees, up 34% on year.
The company's EBITDA margin in the financial year ended Mar 31 rose to 10.6% against 8.2% in 2021-22, mainly aided by softening of raw material prices, Kumar said. The company is expecting similar margins with an upward positive bias for 2023-24.
Kumar said the current environment is conducive to the infrastructure sector and the company is confident of securing new orders worth about 250 bln rupees in the current financial year. For 2022-23, NCC had secured new orders worth 258.95 bln rupees, and its total order book as on Mar 31 was at 502.44 bln rupees, executable in 2-3 years.
The company is expecting strong order inflows from affordable housing projects, government projects like Jal Jeevan Mission, and electrification and tunnelling for road projects.
Ahead of the upcoming general elections in 2024, the government is likely to make more number of announcements compared to previous years, the official said.
NCC undertakes road development projects, executes irrigation projects and has interests in segments like building construction and mine development. The company is actively working on retiring its gross debt, which is at 9.83 bln rupees as on Mar 31. The company incurred a finance cost of 5.1 bln rupees for 2022-23, an increase of 11% on year.
The company expects to generate revenues from settlement of an ongoing arbitration case with Sembcorp group and from proceeds of the sale of its land parcel in Visakhapatnam to GRPL Housing Ltd. This will help NCC to repay at least 2 bln rupees of its gross debt this year, Kumar said.
The official said the company has clocked 17 bln rupees of revenue from the Pachhwara North Coal Block mine, where the NCC-led consortium is a mine development operator. It plans to take this number to 30 bln rupees over the years, he added.
At 1431 IST, shares of NCC traded 1.25% lower at 114.30 rupees on the National Stock Exchange. End
