Thaindian News

Kolkata, Oct 30 (IANS) The city-based Infrastructure finance company SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd has posted a net profit of Rs.261.8 million in the second quarter this fiscal as against Rs.331.8 million in the year-ago period, a decrease of 21 percent.Announcing the unaudited consolidated financial results here Thursday, SREI chairman and managing director Hemant Kanoria said the reduction in profit margin was due to the provisioning of much higher deferred tax and interest payments this fiscal.

The total consolidated income of the company increased over 50 percent to Rs.2.44 billion in the July-September quarter, up from Rs.1.62 billion a year earlier.

In the first six months of 2008-09, SREI’s net profit after tax went up 23 percent to Rs.693.8 million from Rs.565 million in the corresponding period last fiscal.

Kanoria said the company’s disbursement in the first half this year was worth Rs.46.5 billion as against Rs.29.15 billion in the corresponding period last year, recording a growth of 60 percent.

“However, the global financial crisis will definitely expose all companies to new set of challenges in the next few months. We are hoping for a disbursement growth of 35 to 40 percent in the second half of the year,” he said.

Dwelling on the effect of the recent global meltdown on the Indian economy, Kanoria said the government needed to take pro-active steps for releasing substantial funds into the infrastructure sector.

“The government will have to increase its spend in the infrastructure sector and rely on greater private sector partnership to pull back the economy from an impending gloom,” he said.