Varun Shipping Company, the country's largest LPG carrier, announced that it posted a 51% growth in its net profit for the year ended March 31, 2009.

The company's yearly net profit stood at Rs 122.8 crore as against Rs 81.5 crore during the preceding fiscal.

It said that the figure for 2007-08 excluded foreign exchange gain because of revision in Accounting Standard 11 (AS-11) by the Ministry of Corporate

The companies were required to account for forex gains/losses under the earlier accounting format.

The company's income from freight and charter hire saw a growth of 7.5% to Rs 914.6 crore from Rs 850.8 crore in the previous year.

At a press meet, Mr. Yudhisthir Khatau, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, said, "It's been a challenging year. Banks were tightening credit, charterers were looking at renegotiation. Utilisation rates have also fallen because of the downturn."

The current year has started with a "recessionary tendency", said Arun Mehta, Chairman and Managing Director. "Our profit margins may be hit in the near term as we have entered into fresh contracts at lower freight rates," he added.

For the existing fiscal, the company reduced its capital expenditure plan to Rs 400-500 crore from Rs 2,000 crore during the last year.

The company has also decided to utilize its complete capital expenditure on acquiring offshore vessels.

Moreover, the company expects that the majority to its total revenues this financial year would come from its international operations because of its new diversified portfolio of offshore marine services.

The company is increasing its offshore business, in which all the 5 vessels are presently operating in abroad markets.

The company aims to strengthen its offshore marine business for deep and ultra deep water exploration activities, which is where the demand will be escalating.

At 12:12 p. m., shares of Varun Shipping gained 1.8% to trade at Rs 60 on the BSE. The total volume of the shares traded was 205,479.