Jan 27 (Reuters) - India's Mahindra Logistics MALO.NS swung to a quarterly profit for the first time since 2022, it reported on Tuesday, as demand for shipping increased during the festive season and its supply chain management segment turned a profit.
The Mumbai-based company's consolidated net profit came at 32.5 million rupees ($354,551.90) during the quarter ended December 31, from a loss of 90.3 million rupees ($985,108.82) a year ago.
This is the company's first quarterly profit since the third quarter of fiscal year 2023. Its supply chain management is its biggest segment, contributing 94.4% to the topline.
Revenue rose more than 19% to 18.98 billion rupees.
For further earnings highlights, [click here].
KEY CONTEXT
The Mahindra Group unit has been facing rising costs and tougher competition from domestic as well as international firms in India’s $342 billion logistics market, along with losses linked to its 2022 acquisition of express‑cargo firm Rivigo.
However, in a pre-earnings note, Elara Capital analysts said the firm would receive support in the third quarter from the addition of new warehouses and its core third‑party logistics business.
They also expected B2B express volumes to improve and losses to narrow, helped by possible price hikes and better operating efficiency.
Although December does not fall within India’s main festive season, which started in mid‑September, year‑end holidays and discount events still provide logistics firms with a modest boost in demand.
Mahindra Logistics, Delhivery and Blue Dart are also facing growing pressure from Amazon AMZN.O and Walmart WMT.O ‑owned Flipkart, which are steadily expanding their in‑house logistics operations.
PEER COMPARISON
Valuation (next 12 months) | Estimates (next 12 months) | Analysts' sentiment | |||||||
RIC | PE | EV/EBITDA | Revenue growth (%) | profit growth (%) | Mean rating* | No. of analysts | Stock to price target** | Div yield (%) | |
Mahindra Logistics Ltd | MALO.NS | 31.06 | 6.08 | 13.80 | 368.58 | HOLD | 8 | 0.82 | 0.78 |
Blue Dart Express Ltd | BLDT.NS | 33.44 | 11.90 | 9.87 | 30.22 | BUY | 4 | 0.78 | 0.47 |
Delhivery Ltd | DELH.NS | 53.93 | 26.54 | 16.07 | 191.63 | BUY | 22 | 0.77 | NULL |
VRL Logistics Ltd | VRLL.NS | 19.66 | 8.42 | 7.10 | 13.46 | STRONG BUY | 8 | 0.72 | 2.96 |
* The mean of analyst ratings standardised to a scale of Strong Buy, Buy, Hold, Sell, and Strong Sell
** The ratio of the stock's last close to analysts' mean price target; a ratio above 1 means the stock is trading above the PT
OCTOBER-DECEMBER STOCK PERFORMANCE
-- All data from LSEG
-- $1 = 91.6650 Indian rupees
Mahindra Logistics Oct-Dec https://tmsnrt.rs/4r3HWVv
(Reporting by Yagnoseni Das and Abhirami G in Bengaluru; Editing by Harikrishnan Nair)
((Yagnoseni.Das@thomsonreuters.com;))
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