Good morning everyone. I would like to welcome the management and thank them for this opportunity.

We have with us today Rahul Gupta, Director, Deepak Goyal, Director Operations, Anubhav Gupta, Chief Strategy Officer, and Chetan Khandelwal, Chief Financial Officer. I shall now hand over the call to the management for their opening remarks.

Over to you, sir.

Thanks, Akhilesh. Thanks for hosting us, and we also have our Chairman Managing Director Mr.

Sanjay Gupta on the call. Good morning everyone and thanks for joining in.

We hope you have reviewed the results and will now walk you through the key highlights for the quarter 4 FY26. It was such an exciting quarter with a roller coaster ride.

Things looked so good till 28th of February, and then the Middle East crisis started, which impacted our performance towards the end of the financial year. Despite that, we could pull off with very strong performance for the quarter 4 FY26, and if you look at the full year results as well, key highlights being number one, nine percent increase in our quarterly volume on year-on-year basis, EBITDA per ton at around 5,500 rupees per ton for the quarter 4, our 37 percent ROE for the full year, closing FY26, negative working capital cycle for the full year, operating cash flow generation of rupees 20 billion and free cash flow generation of rupees 13 billion for the full year, and we closed the year with net cash balance of rupees 15 billion plus in the books.

In today's environment, the way things are changing, it's becoming very difficult to predict sales volume on a month-on-month basis. Since the war started, there have been a lot of upsides and downsides for the global economy and the Indian economy, which is impacting our business in a lot of ways, number one being the shortage of raw material, steel from the Indian mills, and also the global supply chain got disrupted.

Our Dubai operations are operating at 40 percent utilization right now because of the ongoing crisis there. Then there is a fear of price correction in the raw material prices because steel prices have gone up so much in the last three, four months.

There is a de-stocking from our channel partners as well. Energy crisis in India did impact our volumes in the month of March, and things have got stabilized, but then there is always a sword which can come up and which can again impact if there is shortage of fuel, etc., in the country.

Of course, because of heat and elections, there was labor shortage also for the time being, which also impacted our operations directly and indirectly, as a lot of construction sites went for the halt. Our focus right now is to protect our profitability and margins.

When we know that volume prediction becomes challenging in this environment, because EPL Apollo is a market leader and because of our very strong brand positioning, we are able to improve our margins significantly, and this is what we demonstrated in our March numbers as well. Despite April month being slow in terms of volume, this beginning of May is also kind of similar to what trends we saw in April, but in terms of profitability, in terms of EBITDA per ton, we are doing much better than what we have ever guided for.

We will try to protect our full year target numbers in terms of absolute EBITDA, which we had guided in our previous call, and hopefully things will become better as we move forward. Given the current atmosphere, our focus is on profitability rather than just pushing volumes.

Our long-term plan of 8 million ton capacity by FY28 remains totally on track. Our capex commitments, new land acquisition, new product development, distribution announcement in East India, that everything remains on track, so that whenever things recover, we are quickly able to recover our lost volume and demonstrate good performance.

That's all from our side. We would like to take questions now.

Hi, good morning team, just a couple of questions from my end. First, you said Dubai is operating at around 40% utilization.

Just wanted to take an update on galvanized steel, because last time we were facing some gas shortages. How is the operating level at this point of time in those paratotes as well as galvanized steel?

Sneha, see, these domestic operations, they were majorly hit for a few weeks in the month of March. Then obviously things became a bit easy in terms of gas availability, and our plant also moved to alternate fuels.

Things have improved significantly, but yes, like I said, there is always a sword hanging, okay, when the crisis can again hit the industries. I would say, because of that fear factor, we would be operating at 80-85%.

If we know that crisis has fully gone, then of course there could be 15-20% increase in the production from the current levels.

Understood. You also said about this demand weakness or probably de-stocking, could you actually bifurcate that into whether it's actual demand weakness on the ground, and has government spending actually picked up in any way, or is it the mere de-stocking which is taking place and we are short-looking at a rebound here in terms of demand?

That's one, and any changes in the guidance because of the current situation that you may want to give up?

Good morning, Neha, Sanjay this side. See, this type of atmosphere, we can't say that this is a de-stocking or this is a demand slowdown.

It takes some time to analyze these things. Whatever we give the yearly guidance in terms of volume and profitability, I think volume थोड़ा ऊपर-नीचे हमारा हो सकता है due to the same scenario.

But अगर volume ऊपर-नीचे हो तो we are trying to keep our margin intact. Margin अपना increase करके काम कर रहे हैं this time.

We are not focusing on our volume, we are focusing on margins. जब थोड़ा atmosphere ठीक हो जाएगा, steel shortage भी country में खत्म हो जाएगी, then we are focusing on the volume, and then तो उस समय हम margin कम-ज्यादा करके अपना volume वापस खींच लेंगे.

Current scenario में अभी quarter on quarter, month on month guidance देना बड़ा मुश्किल है. Yearly targets को we are intact.

हमारा कोई भी change नहीं है. Maybe थोड़ा volume कम होगा तो margin को protect करने की कोशिश करेंगे.

Understood. That was really helpful.

Thanks a lot, team, and all the very best.

Thank you.

Yeah. Hi.

Thank you for taking my question. Sir, one question I can obviously guide in, difficult to give in the current scenario, but if you look at realizations and obviously the… at the time, how are we looking at that, given HRC prices have also gone up, but the risk from Patra also remains to sort of take away some volumes.

How are we managing the margin bit in this scenario, even though volumes are slightly volatile right now?

Patra segment, I am also talking in the last call also, कि Patra segment में हमारा जो volume है, इसमें बहुत कम कर दिया हमने अपने segment से, test volumes जो हमारा less than 30% रह गया है. उसको हम धीरे-धीरे कम करते जा रहे हैं.

तो वहाँ से तो हमको margin भी pressure नहीं आता है क्योंकि we are focusing on our brand and innovations. हाँ, जो हमारा galvanized और coated products है वहाँ पर भी we are some margin due to shortage also, इसका हमारा सब margin definitely हमारा better आएगा.

Dubai में भी हमारा volume कम है but margin साथ better.

Okay. What is driving this margin mainly?

Is it better realization that is driving it?

Mainly, boss, you can say market leadership, product innovation, and supported by the shortage of steel also.

Perfect. Sir, one last question.

I think capex, absolute amount, how much are we expecting to spend in FY27? तो हमारा वही target रहता है, 5-6 hundred करोड़ के आसपास yearly

capex. Total हमारा capex around pending है because for 8 million around 1400-1500 करोड़ का capex plan total हमारा pending है.

तो उसको next

two and a half years में हम पूरा करेंगे. 40 million.

Perfect. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning, sir, and thank you for the opportunity, and congratulations on a decent set of number in a very challenging time. Sir, I just wanted to understand the sustainability of 5500 on margin going forward, considering that the Patra and the primary gap is higher, and this quarter you would have benefited from the shortage of material in the galvanized segment.

Plus Dubai is also not picking up. Could you give us a little bit more insight into this?

Margin sustainability पे, if you say from 5000 to 5500 rupees per ton, ये तो हमको लगता है long-term basis पे हमारा sustain करेगा. हाँ जो अभी 6000 plus का अभी हम try कर रहे हैं current situation में, ये sustain कर पाएगा, नहीं कर पाएगा this I can't say anything right now.

But 5000

to 5500, जो last year हमारे दो-साल का track record देख के हमने जो हमारे product का margin देखा है, we are quite sure कि now in the future we continue this margin. Any portion of the inventory gains would have been involved in this?

Because the prices rise so sharply?

Boss, any inventory है कि हमारे पास books में मोटा-मोटी old rate पे ही पड़ा है. Maximum जो price increase हुआ 1st April को हुआ है.

1st April को almost 4500 rupees price बढ़ा था. तो हमारा book में जो inventory है, वो तो अभी old rate पे ही है.

और inventory ज़्यादा है भी नहीं हमारे पास. If you see our balance sheet, we are almost 25 days inventory level पर हैं.

उसमें scrap भी होता है, branches में stock भी होता है, फिर pending orders भी, OEM and export के pending order भी होते हैं. I can say कि free inventory जो हमारे पास है,

13-14 दिन की free inventory होती है. तो उसमें तो क्या gain आएगा, क्या loss आएगा?

Understood, sir. Sir, in the past we have seen when the prices rise so quickly, we usually had a problem securing the raw material.

Anything, that sort of problem we are facing right now, also considering that some of the capacities would have been curtailed, like ArcelorMittal?

April में raw material shortage था. I think in the month of May, raw material shortage ease हो रहा है.

जैसे अगर raw material shortage ease होगा तो हम भी market supply push करने की कोशिश करेंगे. To be frank, April को तो हमारी portion नामा और Malta नामा पर बाहर था.

तो we just remain आराम से बैठकर अपना काम करते कि margin को focus कर लो. अब May से raw material shortage ease नजर आ रहा है.

तो we are also trying to push our volume. देखते हैं, let us see.

मतलब अभी कुछ भी too early to say कि क्या होगा. Yearly commitment और guideline में मेरे को कोई doubt नहीं है.

Noted, sir. Sir, last capital allocation policy पे एक question है क्योंकि अपना cash generation is far exceeding our capex requirement.

तो क्या करेंगे? हम dividend बढ़ाएंगे, कैसे रहेगा?

मेरे ख्याल से अगर मैं देखूँगा

net में लाइबिलिटीज आज के लिए तो 500 करोड़ का cash रह गया है. 500 करोड़ का मेरा liabilities रह गया है once Q1 और Q2 में slightly इसको खत्म करने के बाद no doubt cash से क्या करना है, वो dividend बढ़ाएंगे या buyback करेंगे.

So

we can expect good dividend going forward for this year?

I can say yes.

Thank you, sir. That's all from my side, and all the best for future.

Thank you.

first of all, most delighted at this quarter results, more than the quantum of the growth, it is the outstanding quality of the growth, which is really, really impressive, I must say. When I think the focus on the profit pool, focus on maintaining the hygiene and strength of the sales, which has been the base for last several quarters, is finally showing up in a remarkable way in our operating results.

What really impressed me was end of December quarter, our net cash on the balance sheet was 550 crore, and end of March 26th, it is 1500 and 1510 crore or whatever, which means 1000 crore, almost cash is being added in a single quarter, while profits have been net profit of 350 crore in the quarter, but net cash added on the balance sheet has been almost 1,000 crore. I think this is truly remarkable.

Anurag,

would you like to throw light on that?

Sure, Bhargav. There are two, three factors.

One is that during our Q3 call, we had said that we are taking some steps to further rationalize our inventory churn. Some of the SKUs we wanted to start manufacturing at a single plant rather than being spread out.

Which leads to inventory hold-up, raw material inventory hold-up at multiple plants. That strategy actually worked pretty well, where we could almost reduce our absolute inventory in terms of tonnage by 30-40,000 tons.

Okay? If you look at the inventory levels as at 31st December and 31st March in absolute value, there is a 250 crore reduction, despite the fact that steel prices went up.

You can imagine that in terms of absolute volume, the reduction is much more. That strategy of inventory rationalization actually worked.

Yes, there were some better payment terms from the creditors. That also helped our cash flow generation.

Then, yes, like you said, 350 crore of cash flow generation for the quarter four, which helped in kind of piling up the cash.

Absolutely remarkable. I must say this, and the whole team deserves congratulations, because single quarter cash addition of 1,000 crore is a really, really remarkable number.

Given also, not that happened in a quarter. These days not happens every day.

In a quarter so many things have happened, and the business has delivered. This is really remarkable.

The target after the residual 500 crore liability, once they are retired, maybe in the first quarter also, in the current quarter, I think the target to reach negative working capital is intact, right?

That's right.

Okay. Finally, Sanjay, when you say the year in entirety, the targets remain intact.

Just to refresh my memory on that, are we saying about 20% volume growth, which, if I'm not mistaken, we were...

I tell the last call, 15-20% growth, and 22-25% EBITDA growth,

and

25-30% PAT growth.

Oh, fantastic. Okay.

That is the guidance that we are talking, which...

Yeah. More than that, I think 20% करना थोड़ा मुश्किल हो जाएगा, abhi ek-aad

mahina aur kharab chala gaya, Sanjay Gupta (Chairman and Managing Director, APL Apollo Tubes):

we are targeting 16%, but margins point four up, we are very confident अभी भी still, ki we can achieve.

Absolutely. I think that focus on maintaining and enhancing actually the quality of the performance rather than...

This is our main focus area.

It is really remarkable, and 40% plus ROCE, which I think will go even higher in the fiscal 27, net cash balance sheet, and yet having global size addition to the capacity, and through the challenging time achieving all this, truly remarkable. Hearty congratulations, Sanjay.

Thank you, Bharat Bhai.

Hi, sir. Thank you for taking my question, and first of all congratulations for the great set of numbers.

Sir, my question is currently for the application-wise our segment housing is contributing the maximum, is across 64%, and second number is commercial buildings, and third number is infrastructure, 13%. Over the next two, three years, do we expect that infrastructure and commercial buildings share will be higher due to the government effects and all these things?

So

definitely there should be some improvement in infrastructure and commercial. Commercial has been doing pretty well for last two, three years, so that mix continues to improve.

Infrastructure from the government side has been on slowdown for two years. That's why the residential sales mix improved in the overall pie.

Yes, we do expect government to start spending heavily, and if it does, there could be 2-3% improvement in mix from infra side. Otherwise housing will keep on taking the lead.

Sir. All right.

The rest of the questions I have we answered. Thank you so much and all the best.

Thanks.

Thanks for giving me the opportunity. My first question was, can you provide us share of SGPL to overall volumes in Q4?

It's between

8

to 9%. 8

to 9% of total volumes, right? Of

the total volume, yes.

Not general product, total volumes, yeah. Also our other expenses I think have grown 13% QOQ.

Just wanted to know, is there any specific reason for this, or is this in line with normal operating activity? So

there are two, three things here. One is the freight cost.

The outward freight cost was a bit higher in the quarter four, okay, on QOQ basis, because there was a shutdown of our operations in a few plants, right, because of gas shortage, we had to feed the market from the other plants. That's why the outward freight was a bit higher.

Secondly, we did some branding expenses in the quarter four, so that was higher on QOQ basis. These are the two main factors.

Just wanted to understand, let's say if the war had not broken, but still, let's say we would have seen the same increase in steel prices, the sporadic rise that we have seen in steel prices between Q3 to now. In that scenario, could we have made EBITDA per ton in excess of 5,500?

Because why I am coming on this question is, you would have lost some volumes, but still. That means that operating leverage would not have really kicked in in your numbers, but still you were able to make 5,500.

Just wanted to understand, is this purely because of lower HRC price that you would have seen in your inventory that has actually kicked in EBITDA per ton, or is there anything else? Hello?

Darshan, during our quarterly call, we had guided for around near about 1 million tons of sales volume in quarter four with 5,300-5,500 per ton EBITDA, okay, for the full quarter. Till 28th Feb, we were pretty much on track to achieve these numbers, and when the crisis started, then this whole disruption started to hurt the operations in Middle East, in India because of gas shortage, and then steel shortage and steel price hike.

Yes, if war had not started, we would have met our guidance which we had given in the quarterly.

Irrespective of the rising steel price that we are seeing. I'm not talking about Q4.

Let's say even in Q1, assuming steel prices are where they are currently, and do we think that in terms of...

Darshan, sorry,

because

it's tough to say that steel prices increased pretty much after war also. There was some increase during Jan-Feb-March, Jan and Feb month, but after war, the acceleration in steel prices was pretty high.

Understood. Understood.

Understood.

Hi, good morning. Just wanted to understand your market share movements, I believe these kind of disruptions that we are seeing, let's say the issue around fuel availability, around metal availability, is it fair to say that this is structurally positive for you wherein you gain market share from the unorganized players?

Amit, which we did, definitely. We have demonstrated this similar trends during COVID times, okay.

The industry leaders, the strong players, they always benefit from the disruption which impacts the overall industry. Yes, it enhances the resilience of our business model that we can maneuver our strategy based on the conditions which keep on coming and going.

Yes, at the same time, we wish that things become back to normal, so that whatever guidance we have given for the full year, we are smoothly able to achieve that.

I wanted to understand more on the market behavior honestly here. Like we have seen in other industries also, generally high inflation sometimes also lead to downtrading and actually some gains to unorganized players.

In that context I wanted to understand, is this current situation that is positive for you on a structural basis, or fears of downtrading to happen because of high inflation?

See, Amit, this disruption is not gonna stay for more than six months, okay. Any expert you talk about, people keep on saying that it's been two months.

It was earlier two weeks, honestly. It's been suching quite a bit, we don't know.

Yes. If it is for say four months put together, two months have been passed and another two months, then whatever benefit we could get, we have already achieved that, right, in terms of market share gains, in terms of pricing power, in terms of margin improvement.

Okay. Yes, if it goes beyond four months, right, then obviously the weaker players, right, they will not be able to run their plants because of gas shortage.

Obviously larger players have access to resources. We have seen that in other industries, similarly in building materials, okay.

Yes, whenever disruption takes place, stronger companies, larger companies, organized players, they will definitely benefit at the cost of weaker players. Yes, to answer your question, if things get wrong more than what anyone is expecting, then obviously the benefits will keep on accruing more and more for stronger players.

Got it. That's all from me.

Thank you.

Hi, good morning. Am I audible?

Congratulations, Sudhishi, for a good set of numbers. My first question pertains to the inventory, which has come down significantly, multi-year low, and I think this was as per guidance.

Just wanted to understand the sustainability of the current level, or is it this was also an impact of some risk of during the turmoil? So

Rajesh, Sanjiv's mission is to bring it further down, okay. That's what he has given mandate to the relevant team to keep on bringing inventory levels down and down and down.

Yes, whatever we have achieved as at March 2026, it is highly sustainable.

It is fairly nicely here. On the EBITDA front, Sanjiv has mentioned around 20-22% EBITDA growth, and in which you are factoring to 15% for the volume growth and margin expanding of around at close to 55,000.

Is this understanding correct? For 55,000?

Our budgeted growth is very clear, we are targeting 15

to 20%.

EBITDA growth is 20

to

25%. Net growth is 25

to 30%. Yes.

Great. Just wanted to understand

this 55,000-rupees,

which works out to be at least on the EBITDA margin. What will drive this?

Is it the better product mix, or what?

Better product mix.

Better product mix is what will drive your margins. Okay.

And

sir, on the April you mentioned the volume has been muted. What does this mean?

This is low signal? Is it growth you are indicating, or flattish?

Also we read into the April and May volume coming through?

And

in general, what is the construction and availability impact? और कुछ भी कहना मुश्किल है, क्योंकि अब पहला बार तो

very frankly 2.5 lakh ton हुआ है. ये अभी early two-three days अच्छे नहीं गए हमारे.

But जो भी है flatish to higher,

last year हमारा 7.9 lakh ton, if I remember,

7.9.2 lakh ton था मेरा. तो and if you ask me, जो achievable लगता है मेरे को 2.5, 2.75, या 3 lakh इस महीने कर लूँगा.

3 lakh भी कर लिया इस महीने, 2.5, plus 3.25. 8.5 touch कर सकते हैं.

Okay. 8.75 touch कर सकते हैं.

Understood. Okay.

Next two months we are looking at May and June, better traction to happen.

We have said, एक तो problem steel का भी था. वो problem में लगता है जो session आया, steel का problem खत्म हो गया है.

We are down a little bit aggressive in the market. So हमने तो May we can do 3 lakh ton and June we back on track with 3.5 lakh tons.

Sir, this margin performance of March quarter, do you believe that this could be repeated in...

This should continue. उससे तो better ही रहना चाहिए.

Great. Last year, you just pointed, that we mentioned that the surplus cash beyond whatever certain liabilities we want to reduce.

After that,

whatever surplus is there, we use that to either increase dividend or do a buyback.

Yes.

Great. That's all from my side, all the best.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning, sir. My question is regarding whatever the commentary you are giving, it looks like there are more headwinds than the tailwinds currently, given whatever the situation on ground is.

That's the correct understanding?

Yes, of course. Whatever happening globally and in domestic markets, yes, you have assessed it pretty right.

So, I have to say that this is only and only because of the war-like situation, right? Because before the war broke out, you were quite bullish.

In fact, you raised the guidance as well in Q3. Whatever is...

Yeah,

so we are not reducing our guidance as of now, right, for the absolute EBITDA. Okay.

Yes, like we were discussing on the previous call, every disruption brings some opportunities for the better companies, and we try to grab that in our favor.

Another question regarding this was, now you have a good amount of cash with the financial strength you have on the balance sheet, how can you capture more and more market share from the competitors, given the current situation? Because they must be also suffered quite a lot.

If the biggest player is suffering, giving a flattish kind of growth or low single-digit kind of growth, their situation would be even worse. How can you use the financial strength to gain even more market share from competitors?

This is what, if you look at our market share in FY26 versus FY27, FY25, our market share has improved to 60%, 65% from 55%. Okay.

This can continue to improve if disruption continues to hurt our competition more than the larger player like Apollo.

So What kind of steps you are taking to gain that kind of market share, given the strength you have financially?

One is the capacity building. Okay.

The capex is fully funded from internal cash flows. We were not present in East India much, right?

Putting up two plants in East India will help us compete intensively with the local smaller players there, and that results we will start seeing in next one to two years as our both plants become operational. Second, we are building capacities for lighter structures in South India.

We believe that we can gain more market share, okay, if we increase our capacities there. Our new Bangalore plant, which we call it Mandur 2, that we are going to build up over the next two years.

That again is on the back of strong balance sheet, where my large capex is funded from operating cash flows. Balance sheet can only help fund capex, right, without leveraging from...

This is what we are building, capacity building, and second, branding also with better margins. We will spend a bit extra on branding this year, which will again help us gain market share.

So

this capacity building exercise you are saying is more of a mid to long-term kind of a thing, right? Immediately in the short term, what you are doing in this war-like situation to gain from the competitors, given the strength you have financially?

So

mainly working on SKU management and branding. These are the two things we are doing.

More dealerships or something like that you are doing? Anything with the dealers you are doing?

Dealership in existing territories are fully leveraged. There is no scope to add new dealers in the existing territories.

New markets where we are going, there we are developing new network.

All right. Thank you, sir.

Hi, sir. I just wanted to understand, was there any impact from this LPG shortage or anything on our overall operations?

Can you be a bit louder, please?

Am I audible now?

Go ahead. Yeah,

was there any impact from this LPG shortage in our business? Do you have any backup plans for that?

So

definitely, month of March, two of our product categories in India, these are two pipes and coated products, they faced temporary shutdowns at a few locations. Our plants moved to alternate fuel.

There was disruption of 10 to 15 days. Yes, there was definitely some disruption because of that.

What is your backup plan? You have now kind of mitigated the same?

Right. Alternate fuels have helped the capacity ramp up at those locations.

It's just that that fear of energy prices coming back is always there. Things have become much better than what they were for those two weeks in month of March.

Still because of fear factor, we would say that we are operating at 90% level, not 100% levels.

This 15 to 20% growth guidance which you are giving is factoring in this, right?

Of course, yes. Unless things become really worse from here, if there is shortage of fuel to run vehicles, cars, automobiles, then it will be extraordinary situation which will make us reconsider our business plans.

And In the demand industries where you supply these, will you also facing similarly such issues in terms of shortages? Do you feel the demand will be enough to support this kind of growth?

In terms of market share gains.

It will be a combination of both, right? Our material goes at the construction sites, right?

Construction sites got halted for multiple reasons, labor shortage, all raw material prices at construction sites went up: steel, tiles, plumbing pipes, paints, right? Many construction materials.

Contractors, they try to delay the purchases. Once things settle down, contractors will renegotiate pricing with their customers, right?

Things will start coming back on track. Then this pent-up demand will come back, and we are hoping that we will be able to take share from that, and that's why we are giving that 15 to 20 percent volume guidance.

Yes, of course, if things become further worse from here, okay, then we'll see, then we'll evaluate again. Right now, whatever is happening around us, it looks like things should settle down quickly, and we will be able to achieve our volume guidance.

Sir. Thanks and all the best.

Hello,

Okay. Thank you for the opportunity.

I just one thing about your validated related question. Your report has the validated sales mix of 25 percent in Q4.

I down slightly from 57 in Q3. Despite this, EBITDA per ton rose to a record high.

It's a double five two five. Can you brief me this?

Was it driven by the inventory gain, or was it trade in general category? It was some through three four zero five EBITDA per ton, or a specific cost efficiency at Raipur plant.

So

there were two reasons. Number one is the Apollo, HP Apollo brand premium, okay, which led to better pricing in general category.

If you remember that we had increased the pricing for Apollo General segment in January of 2025, okay, by almost 1,500 rupees per ton.

So

that price hike is straightaway coming to our EBITDA, okay, for the general product. That's why from 2,000 rupees per ton EBITDA level, we are at 3,500 percent plus level in general.

This is the main driver of the profitability, okay? Second, yes, of course, cost realization steps we keep on taking 24 by 7.

Some measures keep on delivering results.

My next question related to ESG decarbonization. Now that you have achieved the SBTi validation, what is the incremental capex required annually to meet 25 percent emission reduction target by 2030?

Will it impact manufacturing cost per ton significantly?

No, in fact, whatever steps we take for better ESG compliance, it actually results in lower cost. For example, you invest into renewable energy, right?

That brings down your overall cost per ton, power cost per ton, right?

So

in fact we are experiencing opposite, that you invest into ESG compliance, it actually end up yielding better results for you in terms of cost optimization.

Thank you so much for answering, sir. Rest of the questions are already answered, and thank you all.

Thank you for opportunity, and best of luck for next quarter, sir.

Thank you.

Just a follow-up question, given the current steel prices, how would be the realization number looking sequentially Q1 versus Q4, based on current prices?

Rajesh, can you please repeat?

Sure. I'm saying basis the current steel prices, which are significantly higher and have been rising even in April, and in this scenario, I'm sure not everything would have been captured in Q4 numbers in realization.

What sort of price increase on an average is in sales versus Q4 average?

If you look at the HR coil prices, okay, in the market, they are up by around, from March to May, okay, or I would say from April to May, they are up by around 3,000 rupees per ton. That much price hike we took, Rajesh.

Okay. That is what would be reflected in Q4 realization, cost number.

Yes.

Okay. Just last responded from this inventory gain.

I believe somewhere during the call you mentioned we are trying to 15 days of finished goods inventory. In August, it is quite lean.

Because finished goods inventory, raw material inventory is 15 days.

Raw material, okay. HR steel rather.

If HR steel prices is going up, would you have to mark up your inventory, and would that lead to some inventory gain in Q4? So

Rajesh, what happens is that since our overall inventory churn is less than 30 days, and in India steel prices are revised once in a month, okay? By the time next cycle comes up, we are already out of our previous cycle.

Okay.

Correct. That's why the mark-to-market is not significant.

It's very, very minuscule.

If my

net inventory days are higher than 30 days, then there will be mark-to-market in my balance sheet.

Basically none of your numbers would have any padding of inventory, in case steel prices were to again come back, you won't have any issues over there. That's right.

That's right. It only happens when there is a significant drop in steel prices, sometimes, like what we have seen, there will be a time when steel price are revised twice in a month, okay, which happens once in a decade, okay?

Then there could be some gains or losses, okay, which would be significant. Otherwise, 11 out of 12 months steel prices are revised once in a month, so that doesn't hurt us.

Agreed.

Yeah,

great. That's all from my end.

Thank you and all the best.

Thanks.

Thank you, everyone, for joining us, and thanks Emkay for hosting us. Look forward to see you in the next quarter.

Have a good day.