Top Indian Refiner Faces Profit Hit From Price Surge

Reliance Industries, the biggest oil refiner in India, is expected to report a drop in profits for its fourth quarter to March, driven by the oil price surge caused by the war in the Middle East.

Based on a poll of brokerages, Reuters reported Reliance Industries could book a 3.7% decline in quarterly profits on an annual basis, even though revenues are seen 8.1% higher than a year earlier.

“Refiner (including Reliance) earnings should in theory benefit from higher cracks, but high crude premiums and operating costs could be a material, uncertain drag,” Reuters quoted JP Morgan analysts as saying.

Jefferies, meanwhile, noted that Reliance’s oil-to-chemicals division’s performance would be adversely affected by not only higher crude oil prices but also higher freight costs and a boost in the production of loss-making liquefied petroleum gas.

India is a major consumer of LPG, which is widely used for cooking fuel. Around 60% of Indian households rely on LPG for their primary cooking fuel, and the blockage at the Strait of Hormuz, from where 90% of all Indian LPG imports pass, has been immediately felt by consumers.

Amid the supply crisis, which has had the Indian government cut LPG supplies to commercial establishments and industries to have more cooking gas available for household use, authorities are pushing for an expansion of the city pipeline gas networks to replace LPG cylinders and use where possible.

Reliance has seen its shares dip by 8% since its last quarterly report, which came out in January, as it struggled with the effects of the Middle Eastern war, like the rest of the global refining industry. Even before the war, however, Reliance faced problems because it was a major buyer of Russian crude and suffered a crunch after the U.S. imposed sanctions on its biggest supplier and business partner in the Jamnagar refinery, Rosneft.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

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