MOIL shares surge 12% on best-ever February production

Shares of state-owned company MOIL Ltd soared as much as 12% on Monday, March 4, after the company announced that it has achieved its best-ever February production.

MOIL said that it produced 1.51 lakh tonnes of manganese ore, 15% higher than the output seen in February 2023.

The company’s production so far in 2023-24 (April 2023-February 2024) stood at 15.84 lakh tonnes, which was also 37% higher compared with the year-ago period.

MOIL said that the production so far this year has surpassed the best-ever production of any financial year since inception.

Reacting to the announcement, the MOIL stock gained as much as 12.1% on Monday to hit an intraday high of ₹313.25. By 12:30 pm, the stock had trimmed some of its gains to trade nearly 9% higher at ₹305.50.

The MOIL stock had seen a sharp rally in the previous session as well after the company revised prices of different grades of manganese ore and other products with effect from March 2024.

A stock exchange filing said that MOIL was raising prices of all other ferro grades of manganese ore with manganese content below 44% by 5% over the prevailing prices. After the price hike announcement, MOIL shares had risen over 6% in intra-day trade on Friday. However, the stock had closed the session later only 3% higher.

The MOIL share price has almost doubled in the past one year. In fact, the stock had recently hit its 52-week high of ₹369.15 on February 2, 2024.

MOIL is a miniratna company, with 64.68% stake held by the government of India. Other public shareholders include the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) that owns 7.5% stake in the company, with another 3% held by MFS International New Discovery Fund.