On Thursday, owing to the decline in net profit of the popular cement maker Ambuja fell 1.84% to Rs 98.80 at 9:33 IST after net profit fell 3.1% to Rs 241.19 crore on a 6.2% rise in sales to Rs 1772.88 crore in Q4 December 2009 over Q4 December 2008. Temporarily, the BSE Sensex was down 319.20 points, or 1.97%, to 15905.45.

The shares of India's second largest commercial vehicle maker, Ashok Leyland gained 4% to Rs 54.20 at 9:15 IST after the company announced that its sold 7,871 units in January 2010 a rise of 222% over January 2009.

The company made the announcement after market hours on Wednesday 3 February. Its shares touched a high of Rs 54.40 and a low of Rs 52.35 so far during the day even as the benchmark BSE Sensex dropped 70 points, or
0.41%, to 16426.. Yesterday the share closed 3.57% or Rs 1.80 up at Rs 52.15.

Coal producer Patriot Coal Corp. on Tuesday reported decline in net income for the fourth quarter mainly due to restructuring and impairment charges. Revenues in the 2009 fourth quarter dropped to $503.2 million, compared to $506.2 million in third quarter due to lower tons sold, partially offset by higher average selling prices.

Revenues for 2009 increased $390.7 million compared to 2008, primarily due to the inclusion of a full year of Magnum results, partially offset by lower thermal coal volume in 2009. Revenues in the 2009 fourth quarter were $37.9.

The second-largest automaker in the US Ford Motor Co. witnessed a decent rise of 25 per cent in its sales for the month of January amid improving economic conditions in the US.

Beating analysts' expectations, Ford managed to deliver 116,534 units last month as compared to 93,506 in January 2009. The company's increased sales have now given rise to hopes that the US may now witness a back to back three-month sales gain for the first time since 2006.

General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC are also expected to announce rise in January sales soon.

Chocolate maker Hershey Co. posted a net profit of 63 cents a share on Tuesday, beating market expectations of 60 cents per share.

Net income of the company, which decided to drop its Cadbury aspirations after Cadbury accepted Kraft Food Inc.'s $18.7 billion offer, rose 54 per cent to $126.8 million (55 cents a share) as compared to $82.2 million (36 cents per share) in the year-ago period, Hershey said in a statement. Sales went up 2.2 per cent to $1.41 billion.

Improved margins helped United Parcel Services Inc. (UPS) book higher earnings in the fourth quarter of the last financial year. However, revenue witnessed a decline due to the economic turmoil in the US, the company announced on Tuesday.

State-run Syndicate Bank posted net profit of Rs 206 crore during the three month period ended Dec 2009 as against Rs 356 crore in December 2008.

The banking institution recorded a marginal fall in its quarterly total income, which stood at Rs 2,677 crore as compared to Rs 2,759 crore earlier.

Net interest of the bank declined 5.15% YoY to Rs.718 crore as against Rs 757 crore.

Apollo Hospitals chairman Prathap C Reddy has announced that Apollo Hospital will invest about Rs 1,800 crore by 2013 for strengthening its bed capacity to 13,500 across 70 operational hospitals in India as well as abroad.     

Presently, Apollo runs a chain of 46 hospitals in cities comprising Bangalore, New Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad.

Moreover, Mr. Reddy has also made announcement about the opening of its 47th hospital with 300-bed capacity in Bhubaneswar.

Pharmaceutical giant Cipla has registered a growth of 29.35% in its standalone net profit for the three month period ended December 2009.

For the quarter ending on Dec 2009, net profit of the company stood at Rs 289 crore as compared to Rs 223 crore for the same quarter of 2008.

Cipla’s net sales during the third quarter surged 6.32% to Rs 1358 crore as against Rs 1280 crore for the quarter ended December 2008.

In its formulations sale in India, Cipla recorded an increase of 14% during the quarter to Rs 659.21 crore as against Rs 578.06 crore in the corresponding quarter last year.

IVRCL Infrastructures & Projects Ltd announced that its net profit for the three month period ended Dec 2009 slumped 1.50% to Rs 45.8 crore as against Rs 46.52 crore in the third quarter ended December 31, 2008.

In a statement, the company said that it recorded the decline owing to an amendment to the Income Tax Act that led to higher tax outgo at Rs 22.94 crore as compared to Rs 9.07 crore in 2008.

Hindustan Unilever has reported a moderate rise of 4% in net profit to Rs 649.11 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year. The sales for the FMCG major grew 4.6% year on year to Rs 4,504.26 crore. The company is India's biggest maker of household products.

The lower than expected results were released on Tuesday by the company. Despite the lower costs of input, the profit margin in the products for the company was at 16% due to weaker performance by its top line products.

For the three month period ended December 2009, Infrastructure Development Finance Company (IDFC) registered a 46% growth in its consolidated net profit, which stood at Rs 269.90 crore as against Rs 184.62 crore during the same period of the last financial year.

The company total income during the said quarter surged to Rs 997.80 crore as compared to Rs 865.20 crore during the corresponding period of 2008.

On the standalone basis, the company registered a growth of 39.53% in its net profit at Rs 240 crore for the October-December quarter.

Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) recorded a rise in net profit to at Rs. 413.70 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year against Rs. 43.60 crore in the same period in the previous year.

The ten times rise in profit was due to many factors including, good performance in the automotive and farm equipment sectors. Other factors which helped the company gain profits include a low base effect in the third quarter last year.

India's largest private carrier, Jet Airways recorded a net profit of Rs 105 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year against Rs 214-crore loss in the year-ago period. The Airline benefited from the lower cost of fuel and income from aircraft leasing.

The sales for the company declined 6.5% to Rs 2,722 crore in the period. The airline has market share of 26.9% in the domestic sector. Jet managed to reduce costs by 19% to Rs 887 crore.

For the third quarter ended December 2009, Sterlite Industries (India) Ltd announced that its consolidated net profit after exceptional items grew 42.35% to Rs 731.3 crore on account of sturdy zinc prices and higher power tariffs.

India's biggest zinc producer had recorded a consolidated net profit of Rs 514 crore in the corresponding period of the last year (2008).

The company's net sales during the third quarter rose 50% to Rs 6,677 crore as against Rs 4,446 crore in 2008.

HCL Technologies has declared the results for the three month period ended December 2009.

During the second quarter, the company's net profit dropped to Rs 296.7 crore as against Rs 320.1 crore in the year ago quarter.

The company's revenues remained flat at 3,032.5 crore as compared to Rs 3,031.4 crore in the corresponding period of the last year.

During the period under review, EBIDTA margin of the company dropped to 21.1% to Rs 638.6 crore from Rs 688.8 crore.

Net profit before forex gain/loss stood at Rs 422.4 crore as against Rs 470.5 crore QoQ.

Indian bank has reported a net profit of at Rs 441.4 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year against Rs 350.7 crore in the same period last year.

The company's Q3 NII rose to Rs 873 crore in the third quarter against Rs 719.6 crore, on Year on Year basis.

The bank's trailing 12-month EPS was at Rs 33.70 per share (Sep, 2009).

The banks stock's price-to-earnings ratio stood at 5.14.

The book value of the firm was at Rs 127.52 per share while the bank registered Price-to-book value at 1.36.

Mumbai, Jan 23 : India's largest car maker Maruti Suzuki Saturday reported that net profits during the third quarter ended Dec 31 had tripled to Rs. 687.53 crore, largely due to improved sales.

The company, in which Japan's Suzuki Motor Corp has a 54.2 percent stake, saw net profit during the third quarter of 2008-09 drop to Rs. 213.57 crore, due to auto sales being hit in the midst of the economic slowdown.

Total income during the third quarter of the current fiscal was Rs. 7,594.1 crore, a rise of 58.09 percent from Rs. 4,803.5 crore in the year-ago period.

India's top mobile operator, Bharti Airtel is facing difficulties in maintaining growth as the price war in the world's fastest growing market has intensified.

The company reported its slowest profit growth in more than three years. The Indian market will double to 1 billion users by 2014.

Net profit rose 2% to Rs 22.1 billion in its fiscal third quarter ended December according to the US accounting standards. The pace of growth was slowest in net profit since at least April-June
2006/07.

Infrastructure developer, Hindustan Construction Co Ltd has recorded a net profit of Rs 14.75 crore for the third quarter of the current financial year against Rs 23.20 crore in the same period previous fiscal.

Praveen Sood, the Chief Financial Officer of HCC said "The net profit figure is not comparable due to write back of excess tax provision of Rs 9 crore in the previous year."

The order book of the firm stood at Rs 15,703 crore on December 31, 2009 and the company expects it to reach Rs 21,000 crore by March end.