Loss Narrows On JLR’s Improved Margins

Tata Motors Ltd. reduced its net losses as its British subsidiary Jaguar Land Rover’s margins improved.

The automaker’s consolidated net loss narrowed to Rs 944.6 crore for the quarter ended September from Rs 4,438.5 crore last year, according to the exchange filing. That compares with the Rs 1,548 crore consensus estimate of analysts tracked by Bloomberg.

This is the seventh straight quarter that the company has reported losses.

The company’s total sales grew 42% year-on-year to 2.43 lakh units in the September quarter.

The total commercial vehicle sales rose 16% to over 1 lakh units, while it sold 69% more passenger vehicles at 1.43 lakh units.

Wholesale dispatches of its British arm, JLR, registered 5% quarter-on-quarter growth to 75,307 units (excluding China JV), which was below the target of 90,000 units for the quarter.

The luxury carmaker’s operating margin improved by 300 basis points to 10.3% in the quarter. The improved supply of semiconductors led to a higher scale of operations.

It contributed 62% to the company’s overall revenues from operations in the quarter.

The company said the lower-than-planned improvement in dispatches was due to a shortage in the supply of specialised chips from one supplier.

Shares of Tata Motors closed 0.44% down before the results were announced, as against a 0.25% fall in the Nifty 50.