Mumbai: Benchmark indices Sensex and the Nifty50 recorded fresh all-time highs Monday morning, and so did heavyweight stock Reliance Industries, as the market opened the penultimate session of Samvat 2073 on a buoyant note.
It looks the year is set to end on an upbeat note. There may be some profit taking later on in the session today and even on Tuesday. But then, despite suffering a few setbacks here and there in the past few months, the market has been mostly steady with key stocks managing to sustain at record highs.
The Sensex hit a new all-time high of 32,687.32. At present, it is up 187.01 points or 0.58% at 32,619.70. The Nifty50 is up 64.35 points or 0.63% at 10,231.80, slightly off a new high of 20,242.95.
This morning, Reliance Industries opened on a high note, with investors picking up the stock, reacting to the company's impressive quarterly results.
The stock advanced to Rs 891.70 in early trades on BSE, gaining 1.7%. However, it retreated subsequently and is currently up just marginally at Rs 880. On the National Stock Exchange, the stock is up 0.4% at Rs 879.70 now, after having advanced to Rs 892 earlier.
After trading hours last Friday (13 October 2017), Reliance Industries reported that it posted consolidated net profit of Rs 8097 crore in the quarter ended September 2017, up 12.79% compared to year-ago quarter. Total income increased 19.42% to Rs 93,812 crore in the second quarter of this financial year.
The stock has come a long way since touching a low of Rs 466 in early November 2016.
Reliance Industries said on Friday that its operating profit before other income and depreciation increased by 39.4% to Rs 15,565 crore in the second quarter ended September 2017, over the corresponding quarter of the previous year, driven by strong operating performance by the refining, petrochemicals, retail businesses and positive contribution from digital services.
RIL's gross refining margin increased to $12 per barrel in the September 2017 quarter, from $11.90 per barrel in the year-ago quarter.
The Chairman and M&D of the company Mukesh D Ambani said that the second quarter results reflected strong underlying fundamentals of refining and petrochemicals businesses, and added that sustained demand growth coupled with supply disruptions further tightened demand-supply balances globally during the quarter.
He said further that retail business has delivered broad based, sustainable and profitable growth through improved operational excellence.
In an investor presentation post announcing its quarterly results, RIL said that it has exited the last of its overseas oil and gas assets after it relinquished two blocks in Myanmar. Following this, the company is now left with no conventional oil and gas property overseas. It has just two shale gas assets in the US.
Recently, RIL sold one of the three shale oil and gas blocks it had in the United States for $126 million, a third of the price it paid seven years ago.
RIL once had 42 blocks o fields in its domestic oil and gas business portfolio, but this has now shrunk to five conventional oil and gas assets and two coal-bed methane blocks. The company decided to exit those assets which it felt were not going to give a good return on investment.
