Bajaj Auto shares drop over 3% despite 35% growth in Q4 profit

Shares of Bajaj Auto Ltd slipped 3.5% after the company’s earnings for the fourth quarter ended March 2024 (Q4 FY24) failed to meet investor expectations.

Bajaj Auto announced on Thursday that its revenue during the March quarter stood at ₹11,485 crore, up 29% compared with a year ago. The company’s operating profit, or EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation), grew 34% to ₹2,307 crore in Q4 FY24 compared with a year ago.

Bajaj Auto’s profit after tax (PAT) increased 35% during the March quarter to ₹1,936 crore.

The board of directors also approved a dividend of ₹80 per share of face value of ₹10 each (800%) for FY24. The dividend, if approved by the shareholders at the Annual General Meeting, will be credited/dispatched on or around July 19.

The record date to identify the beneficiaries of the dividend has been fixed as June 14, 2024. Bajaj Auto also announced that the annual general meeting will be held on July 16.

In a separate development, the board of directors also approved an additional fund infusion of ₹2,250 crore in Bajaj Auto’s wholly-owned subsidiary BACL in a phased manner, in addition to the existing ₹600 crore approved earlier.

BACL is a 100% captive finance subsidiary of Bajaj Auto established to run it as an NBFC to finance vehicles manufactured and/or marketed by the company and its subsidiaries.

On Friday, shares of Bajaj Auto dropped as much as 3.56% to hit an intraday low of ₹8,700.05 on the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE). However, the stock recovered some losses to trade ₹8,770 apiece, down 2.79%, at around 12:50 pm.

The stock price has doubled in the past year compared with a 24% rise in the benchmark Nifty during the same period.