An Arvind Mafatlal company, Nocil is India's largest manufacturer and supplier of rubber chemicals. Its main clientele is the tyre industry with factories in Thane and Dahej. The company sprung a pleasant surprise with a good set of Q3FY16 numbers. Though net sales actually fell 5% (YoY) to Rs.168 crore, cost cutting helped shore up the bottomline. What helped immensely was the drop in raw material prices – rubber, down 20% and overall operating costs down 7%. This helped improve the EBITDA, up 16% at Rs.36 crore and margins rose from 17.51% to 21.43%. It ended the quarter with a net profit at Rs.20 crore, up from Rs.16 crore in previous Q3.

The company has worked hard on reducing its debt – it is down 45% (YoY) and interest cost has halved from Rs.4 crore to Rs.2 crore. As at 31^st Dec 2015, promoters hold 37.61% stake of which 4.26% is held by group company Navin Fluorine and 14.33% by Mafatlal Industries. The good news – net profit for 9MFY16 at Rs.55 crore is almost equivalent to FY15 net profit of Rs.57 crore, meaning it will end current fiscal on a bumper note.