Shares of Ambuja Cements rose 3.9 percent on Tuesday after the company and another Adani Group cement firm ACC announced they have resolved freight issues in Himachal Pradesh and are set to resume operations at two of their plants located in the state.
“All the stakeholders have come together and amicably resolved the ongoing discussions on the freight rates in Himachal Pradesh. In line with our commitments, both ACC and Ambuja Cements will resume operations effective Tuesday at the Gagal and Darlaghat plants,” the company said in a statement.
During Tuesday’s trade, Ambuja Cements stock opened at a price of Rs. 353.35 per share against the previous close of Rs. 352.45 per share and grew further to touch an intraday high of Rs. 366.50 in early trade.
It was trading at ₹358.85, up by 1.82 percent, at 11:35 a.m. on the NSE.
The stock touched a 52-week high of Rs. 598 on December 09, 2022 and a 52-week low of Rs. 274 on March 08, 2022, indicating that at the current level, the stock is trading over 31 percent above its 52-week low and 40 percent below its 52-week high.
The stock has declined over 12 percent in the last six months. However, in the past one year, it has given a positive return of nearly 6 percent. Furthermore, the stock has gained almost 38 percent in the last five years.
On Monday, Adani Cement announced new freight rates for single axle trucks of 12 tonnes and multi-axle 24 tonne trucks for Ambuja Cements' Darlaghat plant and ACC’s Gagal plant. The new rates are ₹10.30 a tonne per km for single axle trucks and ₹9.30 a tonne per km for multi-axle trucks.
This will result in an overall reduction of 10-12 percent in the freight rates and benefit customers of Himachal Pradesh. The earlier rates were ₹11.41 for Gagal and ₹10.58 for Darlaghat units.
The companies had stopped operations in Himachal Pradesh in December after failing to find a solution to soaring transportation costs.
Last week, Ambuja Cements reported a 13.2 percent increase in its consolidated net profit to ₹487.88 crore for the December quarter of 2022-23, in comparison to a net profit of ₹430.97 crore in the same quarter a year ago.
According to a MintGenie poll, 38 analysts on an average have a ‘HOLD’ call on the stock.
