Hindustan Unilever gains 3% as Q1 profit beats estimates at Rs 1057 cr

India's largest FMCG major Hindustan Unilever on Monday said first-quarter net profit rose 4 percent on year to Rs 1057 crore, beating analyst estimates.

The Indian subsidiary of Anglo-Dutch parent Unilever reported a 13 percent rise in sales to Rs 7570 crore in the three months ended June 30, against expectations of Rs 7430 crore.

Hindustan Unilever

"The results of the quarter include a one time credit of about Rs 32 Crores on account of adjustments for unutilized pension corpus relating to earlier periods," the company said in a statement.

During the quarter, HUL's domestic Consumer business grew at 13%, ahead of market, with 6% underlying volume growth, the company said in a statement.

Total income from operations surged 13.3 percent at Rs 7,716 crore in the quarter ended June 2014 compared with Rs 6,809 crore in same quarter last year led by strong volume growth of 6 percent as against CNBC-TV18 forecast of 4-5 percent.

Commenting on the results, Harish Manwani, Chairman of HUL said : "We continue to grow ahead of our markets and have delivered another quarter of strong top and bottom-line performance. While we are seeing headwinds on market growth, consumer spending and inflation, we remain focused on managing the business for long term competitive and profitable growth and implementing our strategy with even greater rigor."

The company further maintained that the operating environment remained challenging with market growth further slowing down but cost inflation was managed through a mix of judicious pricing and cost savings.

Shares of HUL surged 3.19 percent to Rs 683.15 on BSE post the results.

Sanjiv Mehta, managing director and chief executive officer, HUL said all segments have delivered double-digit growth with domestic consumer business growth at 13 percent.

Dove led the performance in soaps while premium and discretionary categories remained under pressure during the quarter.

Revenue from soaps and detergents segment was up 13 percent on year to Rs 3,848 crore.

"In laundry, growth was led by the premium segment with Surf sustaining its strong growth momentum and Rin accelerating across both powders and bars while Wheel continued to show improved growth post its re-launch at the end of last year," HUL said in a statement.

Beverages - tea and coffee - too showed double digit growth (10.4 percent) in revenue at Rs 836 crore while packaged food reported double digit revenue growth of 18.8 percent at Rs 544 crore.