NEW DELHI: State gas utility GAIL (India) Ltd on Monday reported a 90 per cent decline in its December quarter net profit after suffering losses in petrochemical and natural gas marketing business.
Its consolidated net profit of Rs 397.59 crore in October-December 2022 is compared with Rs 3,800.09 crore earning in the same period a year ago, according to the company's stock exchange filing.
The nation's largest gas trading and transportation company booked Rs 349 crore loss in petrochemical business after it had to cut run rate due to curtailment in supply of cheaper domestic gas.
Natural gas marketing division too incurred a loss while the pre-tax profitability of the core transmission business halved.
Revenue from operations rose to Rs 35,939.96 crore in the October-December period of 2022 from Rs 26,175.60 crore a year ago.
The company has faced twin blows on gas supplies - Russia-owned Gazprom Marketing and Trading's has defaulted on delivery of liquefied natural gas (LNG) cargoes following western sanctions on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine last year, and domestic gas supplies have been cut to petrochemical plants to make the scarce fuel available for city gas operators selling CNG to automobiles and piped natural gas to household kitchens.
GAIL has a 20-year deal with Gazprom Marketing and Trading Singapore (GMTS) for purchases of 2.5 million tonnes of LNG annually.
The company is scouting for long-term gas import deals and hopes to sign one contract shortly to make up for disrupted supplies.
GMTS was a unit of Gazprom Germania, now called Sefe, but the parent abandoned the business last April after the western sanctions.
Sefe halted supply to GAIL since May 2022.
In a statement, GAIL said natural gas transmission volume stood at 103.74 million standard cubic metres per day (mmscmd) in the third quarter of FY23 as against 107.71 mmscmd in the second quarter of FY23.
Gas marketing volume stood at 89.89 mmscmd as against 92.54 mmscmd in previous quarter.
Polymer sales stood at 65,000 tonnes as against 108,000 tonnes in comparison to previous quarter.
Sandeep Kumar Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director of GAIL, said the company's revenue from the operation has crossed Rs 1 lakh crore during the nine months ended December 31, 2022, which is the highest-ever in any financial year.