The Chatter by Zerodha

Antimony prices surged over 5x in a single quarter, causing a significant INR50 crore impact despite multiple price increases:

“In Q4, we had a negative impact of about INR50 crores in absolute value due to purely and this is net of the price increases which we have announced to the market. The problem was this antimony was rising so sharply from $11,000, it went up to $60,000 per ton in the same quarter. By the time we announced our price increases, it had further gone up. By the time we announced our second increase, it has further gone up. Therefore, we could not recover everything. So net-net, we had INR50 crores of downside impact on antimony itself in Q4.”
– Avik Roy, MD & CEO

The lithium-ion production timeline was delayed by visa and geopolitical issues:

“We already said that we will be ready with commercial production [of lithium ion] within this year which means FY '26. Earlier, of course, we planned for FY '25 or we announced FY '25. But then there were serious problems on visa issues and things like that, geopolitical issues, which we overcame very quickly. We are lucky to have overcome that. And now we have more than 130 to 150 Chinese engineers in the shop floor commissioning all the equipment, including people from our technology partner. So that's why we said we will start the trial production within this calendar year. And then we will need some time for homologation with the OEMs.“
– Avik Roy, MD & CEO

The withdrawal of FAME-II subsidies led to widespread bankruptcies, leaving Exide with potential payment risks on existing orders.:

“In the past, you will know there was a huge shakeup of the 2-wheeler industry post the FAME-II subsidy withdrawal. So we were sitting on large orders from not so well-known smaller or midsized e2-wheeler manufacturers. They have all gone bankrupt mostly, either bankrupt or in many cases, there is a risk of payment. So we are holding to that because they were largely dependent on FAME-II subsidy.”
– Avik Roy, MD & CEO

Telecom battery sales fell 25-30% as the 5G tower construction boom ended:

“On the infra, we had a drag mainly because of telecom itself. Our lost to telecom was almost minus 25% to 30% because of very high base in the previous year. Because the 5G rollout happened in FY '24 when there was a boom of towers and then that 5G boom went off in December '23. And then from then on, the telecom demand came down, both from the demand side as well as shift to lithium ion solutions. So telecom dragged down the business a big time.”
— Avik Roy, MD & CEO

Hyundai Motor India | Large Cap | Auto & auto ancillary

SUVs now account for 69% of Hyundai’s domestic sales, signaling a clear consumer shift.

"HMI continues to drive quality of sales strategy by enriching its portfolio with regular product interventions to offer superior customer
experience. The SUVation and premiumization strategy has helped us to garner higher volumes in the SUV segment and also improved our domestic ASP. During the quarter, we registered record high SUV sales of 1 lakh 6,182 vehicles, while the annual SUV sales were recorded at 4 lakh 10,200 vehicles, representing 69% SUV contribution to the total domestic sales.
Hashback and Sedon contributed 20% and 12% respectively in financial year 25, reflecting the broader industry shift in customer preference towards the SUVs."

Not eligible for PLI yet due to localization gap

“So u as such we have uh Creta EV is a product we have launched recently. uh but uh you know since you know there is there are some minimum u uh domestic valuation conditions to be met uh which currently u uh you know uh there is some gap there but we are continuously evaluating the uh localization opportunities uh on the EV segment and which we believe that as we have already indicated one is the battery pack we have already done and there are other plans on the component side for EVs to localize going forward. Uh so going forward I think the strategy is to avail the PLA incentive uh but yes currently uh we are not eligible.”

EV component localization beyond battery packs is underway

“Having said that uh we are working on an aggressive localization strategy uh for the EVs especially. So you already know that uh we have already localized the battery pack assembly with the Creta electric. uh we are already working with a local partner uh to localize the battery sales as well. So there are a lot of plent opportunities for us to localize uh the components especially on the EV side. I think when we do that I think that should really support us to bring down the cost and support for the margins going forward.”

Energy

Torrent Power | Mid Cap | Energy

[Concall]

New 420 MW Dholera solar project is still stabilizing, reducing quarterly profits by ₹35 crores:

“As informed in the last quarter, 420 megawatt Torrent DPL [Dholera Power Limited] solar project got commissioned during the last quarter. The plant is under stabilization phase. It was not able to make optimum contribution to the bottom line. Hence, the consolidated PBT [Profit Before Tax] has been impacted negatively. Considering plant running on a CDC [Commercial Date of Commencement] basis, PBT [Profit Before Tax] for the quarter would have been higher by approximately 35 crores."
– Saurabh Mashruwala, CFO

High LNG prices ($12-17) hurt merchant power sales, but recent downward price trends signal potential margin improvement:

"Positive contribution of distribution business are partially offsetted by following reasons. First, the overall contribution from the merchant power and LG sale about 88 crores. LG price have been continued to remain elevated during the quarter trading between $12 to $17. Corresponding merchant sale remained subject due to elevated fuel price and lower demand growth for the quarter.”
“Third, however, the recent gas price have started witnessing downward trends. Competitive gas price compared with NVBN [NTPC Vidyut Vyapar Nigam Limited] tenders and better demand for prospects. We expect the situation should have improved going forward."
– Saurabh Mashruwala, CFO

Torrent raised ₹3,500 crores in first equity placement in 30 years, while government-mandated Section 11 operation of gas plants affected profitability:

“During the year, company made an equity raise of 3,500 crores through QIP [Qualified Institutional Placement] which is the first in the last three decades for the Torrent group. For gas power projects we're able to supply power in merchant market including NVBN tenders and under Section 11 imposed first time on the gas based power plant by the government contributing significantly to the bottom line."
– Saurabh Mashruwala, CFO

Mahanagar Gas | Small Cap | Energy

Record addition of nearly 800,000 CNG vehicles:

"We witnessed addition of 798,215 CNG vehicles, which is the highest numbers of CNG vehicle addition in our areas of operation since inception. And now we have more than 1.1 million CNG vehicles running in our geographies as of 31st March."
– Ashu Shinghal, Managing Director

EBITDA margin guidance of Rs. 9-11 per SCM for FY26:

"Coming to your EBITDA margin, this quarter we have earned around Rs. 10. And on the whole for the year is again Rs. 10. So, it depends what the procurement cost is and how much of it we can sustain and how much we can pass on. Depending on that, we can have a guidance of around Rs. 9 to Rs. 11 as EBITDA margin for the whole year coming 2025-26."

APM gas quantities aren't being reduced but reclassified as higher-priced "new well gas":

"No, let me just clarify, their APM quantity is not getting reduced. What is happening is the APM overall kitty is same. Some of the APM which is getting reduced is reclassified as new well gas. In fact, the APM reduction was lower and the new well gas addition was more in April. But overall if we see, the quantity of gas remains the same, except that the reclassification of APM which is at ceiling of 6.75 mmscmd, will be sold at a higher price, but the quantity of gas remains the same."

Planned Rs. 1,300 crores CAPEX for FY26:

"We are expecting around Rs. 1,300 crores CAPEX for FY '26, and again around Rs. 150 crores will be in UEPL. And we are also in the process of merging UEPL back to MGL. So collectively putting together, Rs. 1,300 crores will be the number expected this financial year." "CNG should be in the range of Rs. 200 crores odd in MGL. And maybe Rs. 50 crores to Rs. 75 crores, depending on how many stations and sites you get in case of UEPL as well.”

Tata Power | Large Cap | Energy

Tata Power will invest ₹25,000 Cr in FY26, with 60% to renewables and 30% to transmission & distribution.

“We have about the capex layout of close to about ₹25,000 odd Cr for next year. Uh and uh if I do a break up, around 60% of the layout allocation will happen in our renewable businesses, you know, and given that we also growing our transmission and distribution, capex is about 30% will go there and the remaining others.”
– Sandeep Churana, CFO

PLF weakness driven by poor wind resource, but plant availability remains >99%.

“Wind speeds in many places were not very good and that is why the wind PLFs are low but our plant availability continues to be very high in all these.”

Private sector entry into nuclear requires law and liability framework amendments.

“We are waiting for the change in the law wherein government has to amend the law and allowing private sector participation in nuclear power plants also the civil liability law.”
– Dr. Praveer Sinha, CEO & MD

To avoid project delays, Tata Power is preemptively securing land and transmission capacity.

“So as a long-term investment strategy, we continue to acquire land in various places as also keep on applying for connectivity. So that we don't have to start looking for it when we win the projects and as you are aware we do large number of projects not only utility scale but also under group captive for various industries, as also for many of the group companies in Tata group. So we definitely would be quite aggressive in acquisition of land as also getting the necessary connectivity from these locations.”

Despite new government rules, the company won’t switch Mundra to domestic coal due to specs mismatch and high transport costs.

“See the Mudra plant is designed for imported coal and imported coal has different chemical characteristics. It's not just the heat rate but what is the sulfur contained, nitrogen contained, what is the ash content. […] Secondly, the cost of coal if we get from eastern part of India especially in terms of the transportation cost is very high.”

JSW ENERGY | Mid Cap | Power Generation

FY25 has been a landmark year for JSW energy, one marked by strong execution, strategic growth and sector leading achievements. This year, they recorded the highest annual wind capacity addition by any renewable energy company in India this year:

"I'm happy to announce and launch our strategy 3.0, our new road map to achieve 30 gawatt of generation capacity and 40 gawatt hour of energy storage by 2030. This strategic vision of '30 by 30' underscores our commitment to powering India's energy security with scale, speed and sustainability. By FY30, we expect our EBITDA on a run rate basis to grow between 2.7 to three times over FY25 to Pharma EBITDA levels. To support this expansion, we plan to invest 1 lakh 30,000 crores in capital expenditure between FY26 to FY30."
– Sharad Mahendra, CEO

JSW Energy strategically expanded our footprint through consummation of two important transactions. One, KSK Mahali power, a 3.6 gigawatt unit on 6th March 25 and O2 power a 4.7 gigawatt platform:

KSK Mahanadi is 3,600 megawatt plant and is the largest thermal asset acquired via NCLT proceeding for a total resolution amount of 16,084 crores. Currently 1,800 megawatt is operational which is 95% tied up under PPAs and has fuel supply agreements. In FY25, the plant reported full year EBITDA of 2,895 crores on a PLF of 67.4%. While the underlying EBITDA stands at 2,382 crores. We have improved PLF from 67.4% which was witnessed during the year to 79% post completion of the transaction in just 25 days of operations which we did in the month of March. The deemed PLF stands at 99% during this period."
– Sharad Mahendra, CEO

Throwing a light on the sectoral performance and highlights, The broad market shift toward thermal procurement affects all Indian power producers and suggests a fundamental rebalancing of the thermal-renewable mix

"FY25 has marked an emerging trend in India's power sector dynamics with several state distribution companies increasingly turning to competitive bidding for thermal power procurement. This trend reflects the growing urgency among states to secure firm power and complement the intermittent renewable generation. Thermal power particularly from domestic coal based sources is regaining strategic importance."
– Sharad Mahendra, CEO

The company has been working on securing long-term contracts for its generation assets:

"In this quarter, we have reduced our untied capacity as now our Vijayanagar thermal plant is fully tied up. This development not only ensures a stable and predictable cash flows but it also marks a fundamental shift in the composition of our open capacity with Vijayanagar fully tied up. Our open capacity now stands at approximately 976 megawatt out of the total portfolio. And out of this 976 megawatt only about 9 to 10% of the capacity is dependent on the imported coal and rest all is on domestic coal. This transformation signifies a decisive move towards a more resilient domestic coal based open capacity reducing exposure to global coal price volatility."
– Sharad Mahendra, CEO

Discussing the company's plans for energy storage capacity:

"Coming to energy storage, we recognize the critical role it plays in integrating renewable energy. We have expanded our locked in energy storage capacity to 28.3 gigawatt hours. Notably, the Bali in Maharashtra the 12 gigawatt hydropump storage project which is tied up with MSEDCL is currently under implementation. In addition, recently in quarter 1 of FY26, we have signed PPA with UPPCL for another 12 gigawatt hour of PSP project to be delivered in next 6 years."
– Sharad Mahendra, CEO

Engineering & Capital Goods

Larsen & Toubro | Large Cap | Engineering and Capital Goods

L&T creates a dedicated Renewable vertical:

"Effective September 1, 2024, the company carved out a separate Renewable sub-vertical out of its Power Transmission and Distribution business within the Infrastructure segment. The creation of this vertical is expected to impart increased autonomy, improve customer proximity, and enhance leadership oversight, thereby enabling us to excel in this expanding space."
– P. Ramakrishnan, Head of IR

The company faces both opportunity and risk as fixed price contracts increase:

"The share of fixed price contracts in the order book is around 46% as of March '25. As compared to 42% as of March '24. The increase is primarily due to the fact that FY '25 has seen a lot of international orders. A major part of these orders are of course fixed price contracts."
– P. Ramakrishnan, Head of IR

L&T maintains a consistent 20-25% win rate in Middle East markets

"As far as Middle East is concerned, why Middle East, as far as total prospect is concerned, our win rate has been between 20% and 25% on a normative basis. There are some sectors where the win rate is much higher. For example, in airports, our win rate is much higher. So it is safe to assume about 20% to 25% win rate, and we have factored that in our plan. We have not stepped up our win rate.”
– R. Shankar Raman, CFO

The company explores Chinese sourcing as a cost-saving opportunity:

"Currently what we are seeing with the geopolitics and in the countries we are operating, China sourcing can be an attractive possibility. We'll have to see how it goes, but we have dispatched group of team to China to study the market more because there may be a window of opportunity when the tariff war is going on between US and China that we might find some good deals which could help us in some cost saving."
– Subramanian Sarma, Deputy MD

Water infrastructure projects in India face delays due to right-of-way issues:

“Water connection is the third important part, and this fits into the larger scheme of things of the Government of India. So according to me, the projects get into difficulty for two reasons. One is Right of Way. The format of the contract so far involve, the contractor to negotiate for access. And when a private contractor negotiates for access, he doesn't have the same clout as Government does, as you can understand.”
“And to that extent, even if I have 90% of the Right of Way secured, the last 10% always play front because they would like to extract the maximum price possible for that last stretch. And they know that with this, the right of way will be resolved. So this is one issue we've been representing to the government that the state should take a larger ownership in providing the right of way, like they did with roads.”
– R. Shankar Raman, CFO

KEI Industries| Mid Cap | Engineering & capital goods stocks

Sanand’s EHV segment will be ready by FY27 and enable export expansion.

“We have a substantial export market of EHV cables which we have developed, but there are some technical constraints due to which we can't sell too much in the export market because of the high freight and heavy loads which has to be carried from the North India to ports.”
– Anil Gupta, Chairman & MD

Explains why margin doesn’t rise with LME copper/aluminum prices.

“So, first of all in the past also we have guided that all the raw material is passed through, whether it's a going up or it's going down, neither will we be gaining anything, neither we will be losing anything. Second is in the case of export, as I said in the case of only 0.5% margin is improved in the case of export or bigger distributor margin, otherwise more or less, prices are similar.
That's why we are not only focused for any particular each segment as we are operating in an environment where we are catering to all type of customers from, where we are getting the orders we are utilizing the capacity accordingly.”
– Rajeev Gupta, CFO

KEI isn't dependent on any one country; US tariff effects will be clearer in 2-3 months.

“As of now whatever order we were having we had delivered, so it will be known only after two, three months, when everything gets settled from the US market. But as I said earlier that, for us it does not matter we are selling to US market, we are selling to Middle East, or we are selling to Asian market or the European market.”
We are approaching so many countries; we are adding one or two countries year-after-year. So that is how we are doing our sale.”
– Rajeev Gupta, CFO

And, who bears the tariff costs?

“It will be borne by the end customer. Our offers are always without duty, so whatever tariffs are imposed in the US, they have to be paid by them, so we are not concerned about the tariff at our end.”
– Anil Gupta, Chairman & MD

No Chinese competition in export markets for project-based cables due to specs and approvals.

“Mostly, in non-US or US market we have only global competition. And in non-US market, wherever we are exporting I have not seen any Chinese competition to us, because we manufacture specialized tailor-made products for projects.”
And wherever tailor-made products are manufactured as per the international specification, and with the specified approvals, we don't face competition from Chinese companies.”
– Anil Gupta, Chairman & MD

Domestic demand is being driven by solar, thermal, EV infra, railways, and data centres.

“The major demand drivers are power generation in renewables through solar and wind energy. And also we are seeing a substantial new investment coming in coal based thermal power projects and related infrastructure in transmission and power distribution by transmission and distribution companies of central government and state government.”
“User industry of energy like data centers, new manufacturing projects and infrastructure projects like railways and metro rails and highways. Apart from that, electric vehicle infrastructure and kit for electrical vehicles is also in our product range, which we are catering to EV infrastructure.”
– Anil Gupta, Chairman & MD

Channel finance now covers 70% of dealer-distributor sales, improving working capital.

“Almost now we have reached to a level where 70% of our sale are covering through the channel financing. And year-after-year we are increasing this sales through channel financing because it is giving us the lower number of days of receivables.”
– Rajeev Gupta, CFO

Kaynes Technology | Mid Cap | Engineering and Capital Goods

Management guides for at least 60% topline growth

“So in terms of growth numbers for our consolidated numbers this year. U we can safely say that minimum 60% growth will be there in operating revenues and we also expect about 50 basis point expansion in our numbers too.”

Semiconductor production expected to begin by Q3 FY26; some capacity already committed.

“We will have probably the first chip coming out sometime if I'm not mistaken in the second quarter or at least early third quarter. Third quarter I think you can fairly expect the first production to happen and then fourth quarter we'll have reasonable production happening.”

Kaynes has applied for HDI PCB PLI support; expects capex subsidies but margins don’t hinge on it.

“So as far as the high density PCB is concerned, we have applied into the PLI 2.0 as required and we are likely to get the PLI there but we depend more on the capital subsidy. And as far as PCB board business is concerned our profitability does not depend on the PLI but on the kind of quality of customers that we have.”

Financial Services

Bank of Baroda | Large Cap | Financial Services

The bank is allocating 10% of operating profit to technology initiatives with plans to increase AI investments:

“So, digital since there are a lot of initiatives which have been taken, so there is a consistent movement on the increasing the spend on the digital or the tech as a whole. So, we are currently somewhere around 10% of the operating profit, that is what we are looking, we will try to upscale it based on the kind of environment in which we are growing. And including with the AI coming in, obviously the cost, the investment will go up on that side also.“
– Sanjay Vinayak Mudaliar, ED

The bank aims to shift its identity from corporate to retail banking:

“On the RAM [Retail, Agriculture, and MSME] book, we almost added 190 bps in last one year, March ‘25 or March ‘24, the RAM has gone up by 190 bps. Considering the segment wise growth guidance we are giving, we continue to have the same journey, maybe in 3 years’ time by adding 200 bps every year we want to achieve 66% in fact. And that would give me a bit of a diversification benefit on the RAM side, not only the return perspective but also a diversification benefit.”
“We want to be known as a retail bank rather than more of a corporate bank, at the same time, the corporate growth continue to be in excess of 10%. And mind it, we are running one of the largest corporate books in the entire country now.”
– Debadatta Chand, MD & CEO

Retail, agriculture and MSME segments show strong growth while personal loan growth has been deliberately moderated:

“As you can see from the asset side, we have given a guidance of growth of 11 to 13% and our asset has grown by 12.8%. And the fact, I would like to bring to your kind notice is that the domestic advances has grown by 13.7%. If I go to the segment wise, the retail is going good with a robust growth of 19.4%. Agriculture and MSME has shown a very potential growth of 14.2% and corporate is at 8.6%. In the retail also, each and every segment has shown a very strong growth with education growing at around 16%, home loan 17%, mortgage 19% and auto loan at 20%.
“As we earlier said, we are moderating the growth in case of our personal loan book, which used to be at 100%. Now we have moderated it to 21% and we continue to have the same growth in future also.”
– Manoj Chayani, CFO

Suryoday Small Finance Bank| Small Cap | Financial Services

The bank expects 30–35% book growth, GNPAs <5%, and 1.5–1.6% ROA for FY26.

“So far as our overall book growth is concerned, we will continue to work with the guidance of 30% to 35%, something that we have been targeting for the last couple of years. Equally, on the deposit side, we expect to grow faster. This is the first quarter when we have been able to achieve a CD ratio of less than 100%, and that's something that we'll continue to target. I think the more important part is, one, in secured mix, our asset mix is going to see the shift. So secured mix is something that we'll target in the range of 55%. And so far as the GNPA and NNPAs are concerned, we will target a GNPA of somewhat less than 5%, NPA less than 3% and a credit cost of 1%.”
– Kanishka Chaudhary, CFO

Bank’s net NPA is fully covered by expected Credit Guarantee Fund for Micro Units (CGFMU) claims.

“So not all of the INR 460 Cr will come in the financial year, about INR 360 Cr is expected to come in the current financial year. But what this essentially means is that my entire net NPA is covered under the credit guarantee scheme”
– Kanishka Chaudhary, CFO

Guardrail 2 implementation reduced group lending, but individual loans are scaling well.

“We have implemented it in November, and we saw a drop of 50 percentage business in new-to-bank customers. [...] But new to bank Vikas loan customer [...] we are seeing some traction on the new-to-bank Vikas loan and the portfolio also is holding good as of now.”
– Sasidhar Vavilala, EVP

Satin Creditcare | Small Cap | Financial Services

Microfinance industry faced a challenging year:

"There is a saying that sometimes disruption is only way to shake us out of competency and forced transformation. This sentiment perfectly captures the spirit of FY 2025, a year many in India's microfinance sector might remember as a testing period, others as a wake-up call. The MFI industry stood at a critical juncture, facing formidable challenges. Institutions had to navigate a shifting landscape, clients experienced heightened vulnerability and the sector as a whole was compelled to rethink long-held assumptions."
– HP Singh, Chairman and MD

Loan delinquencies have improved significantly, with top states performing better than the national average:

“PAR [Portfolio at Risk] 1 improved significantly, declining by 192 basis points from 6.8% in September 2024 to 4.9% by March '25. We also saw a positive shift in PAR 90 that stood at 3.7%, highlighting our ability to arrest forward flows, a result of strong client engagement, early intervention strategies and a risk management framework that continues to deliver.” Further, this improvement was visible across geographies, particularly in our top 4 states: Uttar Pradesh; Bihar; Assam; and West Bengal. Among these, the top 4 states which together account for approximately 61% of our on-book portfolio reported an average PAR 90 of 3.3%, comfortably below our national average.”
– HP Singh, Chairman and MD

New industry standards only increased loan rejections by 3%

“That much I can say, our rejection rates have jumped up by another 3%. That is the only thing which I am able to see, which is there. And that doesn't affect us too much basically, an increase of 3% of overall rejection rates, I think it is okay with us. And we knew this, how much this was coming into.”
– HP Singh, Chairman and MD

Piramal Enterprises | Small Cap | Financial Services

The legacy wholesale book has been reduced by more than half in a single year:

“We were able to reduce our Legacy AUM by 53% year-on-year to Rs. 6,920 crores which now occupies a much smaller part of our balance sheet at 9%; and will therefore be a small contributor going forward.”

– Yesh Nadkarni, CEO - Wholesale Lending

Customer base expanded by nearly a quarter while cross-sell contribution in unsecured loans reached 30%:

“Our customer franchise grew by 24% year-on-year to 4.7 million customers. We have been able to capture a significant portion of our customer originations for future cross-sell opportunities. During FY25 we were able to significantly increase the share of cross-sell disbursements in our unsecured lending disbursements to about 30%.”
“From a distribution standpoint, we now have a network of 517 branches across 428 cities in 26 states. In FY25, we opened 27 branches versus about 90 branches per year that we used to open in the prior 2 years. Our focus this year has been on raising productivity of existing branches and increasing the number of products offered per branch.”

– Jairam Sridharan, CEO - Retail Lending

The new wholesale lending business grew 44% and Branch expansion slowed to 27 new branches:

“Wholesale. 2.0 AUM was Rs. 9,117 crores as at March 2025 which is a year-on-year growth of 44%. While this is a strong year-on-year growth, it nevertheless was tempered due to significant prepayment pressures faced by both real estate and CMML[Corporate and Mid-Market Lending] segments.”
“Repayments were almost 45% of amounts disbursed during the year, signifying better-than-expected performance of the book, which continues to benefit from strong sectoral performance and quality partner / asset selection. Since the inception of the new wholesale lending business about 2.5 years ago, we have not experienced any delinquency in the portfolio.”

– Yesh Nadkarni, CEO - Wholesale Lending

The retail to wholesale mix reached 80:20:

"We wanted to move our Retail : Wholesale mix from 70:30 at the beginning of the year to 75:25 by the end of the year. We have ended this year with the Retail : Wholesale mix of 80:20."

– Ajay Piramal, Chairman

FMCG & Retail

Ethos Ltd. | Small Cap | Retail

[Concall]

Explains the 34.8% YoY rise in inventory, linking it to strategic store expansion and new launches, somewhat alleviating working capital concerns.

“Our inventory remains under control and closely watched. However, the increase in inventory is in line with our strategic expansion, particularly the addition of 14 new boutiques, City of Time, and investment into the Messika boutique, most of which are currently in their early revenue ramp-up phase. Furthermore, inventory for the eight boutiques opening in May [2024] was proactively pre-arranged in quarter four [FY24] to ensure timely and seamless launches. Because of the above reasons, the inventory moved from Rs.440 crores on 31st March 2023, to Rs.593 crores as on 31st March 2024.”
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Entry into a new, potentially high-growth luxury segment (jewelry) through an international brand partnership, diversifying beyond watches.

“Messika, The Chanakya Mall at New Delhi. We are pleased to announce the launch of our first Messika boutique on 14th May, marking a key milestone in our foray into the international luxury jewelry segment. We view this as a strategic step forward in diversifying our luxury offerings, while continuing to approach this category with careful evaluation and a long-term outlook. Looking ahead, we remain on track to be able to cross 100 boutiques during the current financial year.”
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Signals initial steps towards international expansion, with the UAE as the first exploratory market. Long-term implications for growth.

“As part of our international expansion strategy, we have established a wholly-owned subsidiary in the UAE. It's called Ficus Trading LLC. At this point of time, it is exploratory in nature to understand what we can do in the international arena. We have seen notable fluctuations in the CHF/INR exchange rate in the past year.”
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Addresses currency risk by implementing a hedging strategy, which could stabilize margins given significant imports from Switzerland.

“We have seen notable fluctuations in the CHF/INR exchange rate in the past year. We have now implemented a prudent hedging strategy covering approximately 50% of our foreign currency exposure through forward contracts. This approach allows us to protect against the Rupee depreciation while maintaining flexibility to benefit from favorable currency movements on the unhedged portion.”
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Ethos strategically streamlined its product portfolio by removing lower-priced brands, aiming to sustainably balance higher average selling prices with healthy volume growth.

"We had removed some brands on the lower price point from many of our boutiques...focusing now on a healthy mix of volume and value growth."
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Ethos prioritizes profitability and compliance over mere market share expansion, strategically avoiding brands with lower margin potential or compliance challenges.

"We want to concentrate on the profitable segment of market share, not just get market share...brands we don't operate with because we don't believe there is significant profit if you do business compliantly."
– Pranav Saboo, MD and CEO

Sapphire Foods India | Small Cap | FMCG

Pizza Hut's performance is suffering due to an unresolved marketing strategy dispute with their sister franchisee:

"Starting JFM Quarter Q4FY25, we have not been able to invest in mass media advertising and that's resulted in an impact on our transactions and that's really arising out of a difference of view between two franchisees, between us and our sister franchisee with respect to marketing strategy and the additional investment that we have been doing from April to December behind mass media advertising."
“Now while Yum! is aligned with investing similar to us, the difference in opinion has meant that we have not been able to advertise in markets which are common markets and so we still spent money, but we spend money below the line and that below the line advertising was not as effective. We believe that this difference we should be able to resolve in the next couple of months.
– Sanjay Purohit, CEO

Upcoming franchise renewal fees and major store refurbishments will cause the company to become cash flow negative:

“Apart from let's say there could be renewal fees which are coming off as Sapphire Foods, we would be now completing 10 years since our acquisition of the stores. So, there would be a renewal fees which would be coming up for Yum! payment coming here. And apart from new stores there are always agenda on refurbs and typically when you try and complete, when you complete 10 years there are a lot of refurbs which are on major sites, major refurbs other than minor.
“So, we don't expect the cash flow to be positive coming here. We expect will marginally dip into our resources of cash.”
– Vijay Jain, CFO

Value-focused campaigns have successfully slowed transaction decline for KFC:

“In terms of the benefit, we have definitely seen transaction improvement. So, while our SSSG [Same-Store Sales Growth] was negative in H1 of last year, our transactions were also negative. And what we did experience in the last two quarters of last year, which is H2, that the decline in transactions was definitely lower than the decline in the overall revenue for the same stores. So definitely the focus on the value has helped us arrest the transaction decline. Now we are largely neutral on the transactions. Hopefully from here we can grow the transactions as well.”
– Vijay Jain, CFO

The company's own delivery platform is growing three times faster than third-party aggregators:

“Dine-in plus takeaway came at 57% and the delivery was at 43%. Sanjay mentioned about our own delivery growth. Our own platform growth was 3x the growth which we experienced on the aggregator platform so that was a big positive for us. In terms of SSSG, the trend continued to improve. We were at -1% and overall revenue grew by 12% on back of 73 restaurant additions which we had in last one year. Gross margin dropped marginally.”
– Vijay Jain, CFO

Jubilant FoodWorks | Mid Cap | FMCG

Despite free delivery, Domino’s India margins were 14.5%; JFL aims to expand margins by 200 bps over 3 years.

“Despite offering free delivery to customers, Domino’s India margin was at 14.5%. Nearly flat year-on-year.
I see no reason for us that we can't improve 200 basis point from here and that's what Suman had also mentioned during our investor day. We maintain that stance.”
– Sameer Khetarpal, CEO & MD

Management sees similar growth across Tier 1 to Tier 4 cities.

“In fact, when I look at growth of tier 1 to tier 4 cities and I look at it every month, there is like absolutely no difference, right? They're all very similar—one to two percentage points different when I look at order growth.”
– Sameer Khetarpal, CEO & MD

JFL’s new chicken menu is gaining rapid traction, causing temporary sourcing issues.

“We are short. We are constrained on supply of chicken wings. We had to ration chicken wings and in fact stop the business in north and west to serve south and east.”
– Sameer Khetarpal, CEO & MD

Dine-in volumes have turned around after years of decline and are now outpacing takeaway.

“Takeaway is also declining rapidly because there is no reason for a customer to come to the store and take away because the delivery is free. I genuinely believe dining may come back and even surprise me.”
– Sameer Khetarpal, CEO & MD

Tech investments yielding delivery productivity and faster fleet onboarding

“Today we did share on how we have used technology to hasten the process of even onboarding of drivers. If somebody has a license, meets the criteria, it's almost like 30 minutes to an hour and we can get them on the street.”
– Sameer Khetarpal, CEO & MD

Patanjali Foods | Mid Cap | FMCG

Urban slowdown in premium products and seasonal weakness in categories like chyawanprash and ethnic foods hit food sales.

"Coming to the decline in the foods business […] there are two twin factors which have impacted this. One is that we saw very distinct slowdown in the urban sort of demand especially for certain premium products."
"For example, the cow ghee category. Similarly, some bit of seasonal impact that we saw in the chyawanprash business. Likewise, in certain other ethnic food categories like the medicated juices, etc., with the decline overall of the health risk perception that the consumers have had."

Food biz revival driven by urban tax relief, rural distribution gains, and better segmentation.

"We expect three things to drive this growth. Now one is the urban demand. We're expecting with the announcement on the income tax relief and others that came in the last budget that should start spurring the consumer demand."
"We believe that the distribution expansion that we've embarked on—we've moved almost in last from 1.5 to 2 million retail outlets with the addition of the HPC business."
"So a lot of strategies are being worked on. So with reasonable confidence is there that by the ethnic foods category which saw a distinct decline we should not only be able to reset it but we’ll continue to grow between 8 to 10% growth that we set for ourselves."

Page Industries | Mid Cap | Textiles

Uptrading across categories is occurring organically; D2C channels help maintain pricing power and boost average realizations

“There is a preference for scaling up. So that is the premiumization within the categories and e-commerce definitely has a play because one—as long as we are selling to D2C, that is, a marketplace and jockey.in—we have the full price advantage there.”

Quick commerce revenues are rising due to dark store expansion, but contribution to overall revenue remains minimal.

“Quick commerce, while the growth rates are significantly high, its current contribution to the overall business of Page is still quite small to have any impact on the overall gross margins of the brand.”

Leveraging automation and AI in manufacturing, HR, and product development, hinting at long-term margin or efficiency gains.

“We have actually started deploying automation and AI across various parts of the company. Whether it is the manufacturing systems, or whether it is the design and development systems, or whether it is the HR systems, all these places where large data sets are available, where there is potential to optimize the cost, the time and the effort—we are looking at all those areas.”

Westlife | Small Cap | FMCG

Management is seeing sequential improvement and expects to return to mid-to-high single-digit SSSG over the next few years.

“We are seeing green shoots. We are working on sequential improvement and we do feel that the demand environment is picking up – not in a very accelerated way but in a slow and gradual manner.
We have definitely been seeing sequential improvement, as you even see in our quarter results. We feel all our efforts are resulting in the traction and green shoots we want to see.
We remain committed towards Vision 2027, which implies that we plan to get back to that mid to high single digit SSSG over the next couple of years”

Delivery channel growth slowed due to dependence on 3P platforms like Zomato and Swiggy.

“Our business at a significant level was also dependent on 3P operators – Swiggy and Zomato – and we’ve seen some reduction in growth trajectory for sure in both channels.
We are also working now to expand our own channel to compensate for it and continue to be a growth business.”

Informal Indian dining is struggling, while western QSR growth is coming primarily from new store additions.

“The informal eat-out [segment] has been under a lot of pressure, which once upon a time used to have a significant amount of growth. We've been flattish to negative in the last 1–2 years.
In that, we see things happening like ROI vendors and informal Indian fast food also having a lot of pressure, while western fast food is growing on the back of a lot of new store additions.
Western fast food includes a lot of us – McDonald’s and other brands like that – so a lot of growth has come from new store additions. Some brands do well, some don’t. It’s part of the game.”

Chemicals

Pidilite Industries | Large Cap | Chemicals

Urban demand is improving, though rural growth remains stronger.

“So, these specific places, it's eased out a little bit. That is fair and it's also reflected in our overall numbers for the quarter, Quarter 4 if you look at it which we reported, our urban growths have been much better than what they were in the past.”
“Although we have maintained, our rural growth is still ahead of urban growth. So that piece remains consistent. But our urban growth especially for Quarter 4 are much better.”
– Sudhanshu Vats, MD

The company expects India’s electronics manufacturing push to boost long-term demand for industrial adhesives.

“We recognize the electronics, EV and maybe moving forward semi-con opportunity in India. We have recognized that in the past. We are very confident of being able to make good of that opportunity and we are working towards that. I think on the very specific question on how tariffs will play out and how much of that will shift, I would still wait and watch a little bit because I think we have got to see this. So therefore, the way I would respond is that we were bullish on this opportunity. We had recognized this opportunity already. If this opportunity becomes an even better opportunity, we will be better placed to exploit that. I think that is what I would say. “
– Sudhanshu Vats, MD

Lending business in Bangalore is progressing well, focused only on dealers and contractors.

“So, the business we are in here, and while it is classified as lending business, that's correct, but the business we are in is to actually strengthen our applicators or our dealers with availability of finance in order to ensure that they are optimally able to grow. So therefore, our focus will continue to remain our ecosystem defined as our large contractors’ or dealers. So therefore, that's the first key part and I just want to reiterate that because that's very important. We are not doing a classic lending business.”
– Sudhanshu Vats, MD

Healthcare

Aarti Pharma | Small Cap | Healthcare

Pharma-grade pricing is higher, and overall profitability should improve as capacity ramps.

“Overall, the Xanthine derivative prices are stable. Of course, they are low but stable and we understand that the prices have bottomed out. And the pharmaceutical market of course is a regulated market where we require to communicate with the FDAs and the medical agencies of different countries.”
– Rashesh Gogri, Chairman

Any reduction in promoter holding will be immaterial and won’t affect control.

“Different promoter groups have different appetite to and long term plans. So I think there will be minor selling here or there, but it will not affect overall control of the company or anything.”
– Rashesh Gogri, Chairman

Global OEMs are increasingly shifting new products to India due to concerns over IP risk in China.

“No no no actually what we are getting is a lot of big OEMs are seriously considering alternatives with China in the sense they may not replace the entire thing. Obviously that's a little difficult but all the new products etc they will bring to places like India because I think US is very much uh cautious in providing new technology to Chinese vendors.
So they know that that gets compromised. So I think we can look forward. See tariff wars will also kind of cool off at some point in time and India has played that middle in the park very well. So and also we are also having geography side we going to have places in North America producing. So from that perspective I think that solid benefit our company.”
– Rashesh Gogri, Chairman

Real Estate

Welspun Enterprises | Mid Cap | Real estate

Execution in FY26 will be weighted toward H2 due to post-monsoon ramp-ups.

“Execution as a FY26 will be backended. Both Banduk water treatment project and Bharavi carop tunnel projects are at various stages of pre-implementation activities and expected to gain physical momentum post monsoon. Thus approximately 60% of the revenues are expected in the S2 compared to a more even split in FY25.”
– Sandeep Garg, MD

Company faces low to medium competition in high-tech water projects like micro-tunneling.

“In routine water projects the intensity is medium and in specialized water projects it’s further reduced. However, in B-model water projects we expect competitive intensity to remain medium to low.”

WMEL aims for a meaningful share in a massive ₹3 lakh crore tunneling market over 7 years.

“So in Q2 FY25 you have said that almost three lakh crores are from tunneling. I mean the the market size of tunneling is almost three lakh cr for next seven years and you're targeting 10 to 20% market share in this. So which poses that uh we need to secure close to 4,000 cr of orders every year.
So that's exactly what I keep on saying uh the segmental uh split of an order is difficult when you're across vertical vertical. So I I would I would look I would request that you look at long-term guidance as a long-term overall guidance.”

Software & Services

Route Mobile | Small Cap | Software services