See FY18 sales volumes around 36 mt; focus on commissioning steel plant: NMDC

04 December 2017

NMDC  has hiked iron ore lumps prices by 13 percent and fines prices by 10 percent for December, which is the highest absolute quantum of hike in the past 1 year.

Giving the reasons for hiking the prices TRK Rao, Director (Commercial), NMDC said the buoyancy in demand led to increase in prices.

He said domestic steel market is doing well, the pellet prices, sponge iron prices are up and steel prices are also up. Globally too iron ore prices from November have been up, he said, adding that their competitors in Orissa and Karnataka have also risen their prices.

However, on a landed basis, their prices are still competitive and cheaper compared to imports on east coast, west coast, as well as to most of our landlocked plants, he said.

On back of robust demand, he is confident of surpassing last year’s sales volumes figures of 35.5 million tonnes, with a target of 35.6 or around 36 million tonnes for FY18 and 38-39 million tonnes for FY19, he said.

He is also hopeful of EBITDA per tonne going up by 1-2 percent from the current 53 percent.

Talking about the steel plant, he said their focus is on commissioning the steel plant in the first half of next year. It would require, Rs 5000-6000 crore more to commission the plant, he added. The company already has spent around Rs 13000 crore, said Rao.

He said as of now they are looking to fund the commissioning of the plant through internal resources and later may look at borrowing. The current cash on the book stands at Rs 5500 crore, he added.

Source: Moneycontrol