Reliance Industries' fourth quarter earnings beat street expectations as the country's largest private sector enterprise reported a 12.3 percent rise in its March quarter net profit on the back of higher refining and petrochemical margins.

Reuters

Consolidated net profit in January-March quarter at Rs 8,046 crore, or Rs 27.3 per share, was 12.3 percent higher than Rs 7,167 crore net profit in the same period a year ago, the company said in a statement.

For the full 2016-17 fiscal, the company generated its highest ever annual profit at Rs 29,901 crore. The annual profit was 18.8 per cent higher than the previous year's.

Reliance earned $11.5 on turning every barrel of crude oil into fuel in the fourth quarter as compared to a gross refining margin of $10.8 per barrel in the same period a year before.

RIL overtakes TCS by market value

Reliance Industries Ltd today reclaimed its status as the country's most valued firm by market capitalisation (m-cap) after a gap of four years, replacing IT major TCS from the top position.

At the end of trade today, RIL commanded a market valuation of Rs 4,60,518.80 crore. This was Rs 1,586.43 crore more than TCS' Rs 4,58,932.37 crore m-cap.

Shares of both the companies ended on a positive note but gains were sharper in case of RIL.

The RIL scrip ended the day with a gain of 1.19 per cent at Rs 1,416.40 on BSE. TCS also rose by 0.77 per cent to close at Rs 2,329.10.

(Disclosure: Firstpost is part of Network18 Media & Investment Limited which is owned by Reliance Industries Limited.)

With PTI inputs