Batliboi Ltd

This was a name to reckon till a few years ago, but today it seems to have a mixed bag. It is one of the oldest engineering listed companies of India and its existence of 69 years has become that of sputtering and revving. The company has very low profits but the good news is that in current Q2, it has turned around, YoY. This growth has been led mainly by textile engineering segment, which contributed 44% to the sales and showed a 3 times rise in EBIT. Its other segment, machine tools, which contributed 53% to the sales, posted a loss at the EBIT level. The company posted a 17% rise in net sales at Rs.34 crore and it turned around with a net profit at Rs.88 lakh compared to losses in previous Q2 and QoQ, net profit rose 3 times. The company had a forex gain of Rs.2 crore, a part of the other income and that too has helped.

Promoters hold 81.73% stake in the company. This high stake gets sweetened on the news that the company owns a sizeable amount of land bank in Ahmedabad in prime areas. It is stated to own around Rs.25-30 crore worth of free hold land and around Rs.20 crore worth of buildings. One has to wait and watch to see if this trend of profitability continues and what moves the promoters make to bring down their holding to the SEBI stipulated 75%.