Today, the Reserve Bank released data on the performance of the private corporate sector during 2018-19 drawn from abridged financial results of 3,151 listed non-government non-financial (NGNF) companies. Data pertaining to 2017-18 are also presented in the tables to enable comparison. The data can be accessed at https://dbie.rbi.org.in/DBIE/dbie.rbi?site=statistics#!2_42.

Highlights

Sales

• Demand conditions in the manufacturing sector strengthened in H1:2018-19 as reflected in sales growth in respect of petroleum products; chemical and chemical products; textiles and pharmaceuticals and medicines; however, sales growth decelerated in H2:2018-19 across major industries (Table 2A and Table 5A).

• The information technology (IT) sector posted strong improvement with sales growth rising from 5.0 per cent in 2017-18 to 16.2 per cent in 2018-19 (Table 2A).

• The services (non-IT) sector also recorded a rise in sales growth, riding on the support from transport and storage services and wholesale and retail trade; on the other hand, the telecommunication sector continued to experience contraction in sales (Table 2A and Table 5A).

Expenditure

• Manufacturing companies continued to face input cost pressures in the form of cost of raw materials, which increased from 12.5 per cent to 18.0 per cent (Table 2A).

• Staff costs accelerated in the IT sector in tandem with the improvement in sales growth (Table 2A).

Operating Profit

• Supported by an increase in the value of production, operating profit in the manufacturing sector picked up year-on-year from 10.4 per cent to 16.3 per cent, in spite of the increase in input costs (Table 2A).

• Operating profits of the services (non-IT) sector companies remained in contraction (Table 2A).

Interest

• Interest expenses in the manufacturing sector rose by 2.8 per cent in 2018-19, marginally slower than in the previous year (Table 2A).

• Interest expenses incurred by companies manufacturing iron and steel and motor vehicles and other transport equipment contracted in line with the overall reduction in debt levels (Table 5A).

• The interest coverage ratio (ICR) of the manufacturing sector hovered around five¹, while the ICR for the services (non-IT) sector at 1.4 showed no sign of improvement, primarily on account of telecommunication companies (Table 2B).

Pricing Power

• Operating profit and net profit margin remained stable around 14.6 per cent and 6.8 per cent respectively, for the manufacturing sector (Table 2B).

• The net profit margin for the services (non-IT) sector improved, supported by non-operating income (Table 2B).

Notes:

• Explanatory notes containing the methodology followed for compilation of data, and the glossary (including revised definitions and calculations that differ from previous releases) are given at the end.

Ajit Prasad
Director (Communications)

Press Release : 2019-2020/415

¹ The interest coverage ratio (ICR) is the ratio of earnings before interest and tax to interest expenses. It is a measure of a company’s debt servicing capacity. The minimum value for a viable ICR is 1.