Tata group firm Titan Company Ltd on Monday reported standalone loss of Rs 270 crore for the April-June quarter as the coronavirus pandemic severely impacted its operations with retail outlets closed for large part of the period under review.
During the corresponding period last fiscal, the company had reported a net profit of Rs 371 crore.
“The disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in India affected the performance of Titan Company Ltd severely with retail outlets closed for a major part of the quarter, resulting in a decline in income of 62 percent for the first quarter of financial year 2020-21 with the total income declining to Rs 1,901 crore, against last year’s income of Rs 4,995 crore during the same period,” the company said in a statement.
It added that the revenues included sale of bullion worth Rs 601 crore done to reduce inventory given the low level of sales due to the disruptions in activity.
The lockdown impacted the company’s operations significantly in the months of April and May as most stores were forced to shut down.
“While stores started opening in May, post ‘Unlock 1.0′, even as at end of June 2020, only 83 percent of all the stores opened and even for stores that opened, many of them were not operating for all days,” it said.
The statement added that the recovery rate of revenue started improving slowly and as of June it was 21 percent for the watches and wearables division, 77 percent for the jewellery division and 25 percent for the eyewear division.
C.K. Venkataraman, Managing Director of Titan Company said: “The severity of the disruption in business due to the pandemic impacted the company’s performance resulting in an unprecedented loss for the company.”
He added that the recovery in business, particularly in the jewellery business is encouraging and the company expects to get back to normalcy by the fourth quarter of this year.
“The company’s reassessment of its cost structure during this period and inherently strong balance sheet, will help it to create a stronger base for a sustainably higher profit margin business,” the MD said.
In another regulatory filing, the company informed the exchanges that it has incorporated a wholly owned subsidiary company ‘Titan Commodity Trading Limited’.
The subsidiary will carry on the business of trading in various commodities and products by acquiring or registering as a member of various commodity exchanges. It will also acquire and build technology to facilitate trading, dealing, buying and selling of all types of direct commodities or commodity futures and other precious materials, the filing said.
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