UPL: Q3FY22 Revenue up 24% and EBITDA up 21%

UPL Ltd. (NSE: UPL & BSE: 512070, LSE: UPLL), recently reported financial results for the third quarter of FY22 (Oct-Dec 2021).

-    Q3 FY22 Revenue witnessed robust growth of 24% YoY to reach INR 11,297 crore, led by healthy growth in volumes (+11%) and better product realizations (+13%)
-    Q3 FY22 EBITDA grew by 21% YoY to INR 2,666 crore as against INR 2,209 crore in Q3 FY21. In-house manufacturing with backward integration linkages supported by effective raw material sourcing and overall cost management helped in keeping the EBITDA margins largely intact, despite the higher input costs and a sharp rise in freight charges-
-    Without considering the strategic long-term Investment of INR 75 crore in our digital platform, EBITDA growth was 23% YoY and EBITDA margin was 24.3%, in-line versus Q3 FY2

Commenting on the performance, Mr. Jai Shroff, CEO – UPL Ltd., said “UPL delivered another quarter of strong business performance in a challenging environment with growth across all regions except India. We are confident of continuing this business momentum and ending the fiscal year 2022 on a strong note.

During the quarter, we announced a new strategic partnership in Brazil with ‘Bunge’, a world leader in sourcing, processing, and supplying oilseed and grain products and ingredients.

We also undertook multiple initiatives to re-imagine sustainability and in Q3, we successfully raised a sustainability loan of US$700 million. At the same time, furthering our commitment to the Gigaton challenge, our digital platform ‘nurture.farm’ successfully completed its Crop Residue Management Program, thereby preventing release of over 1 million tons of carbon emissions.

Taken together, these initiatives underscore UPL’s commitment to sustainability as we continue to raise the bar for the industry as a whole with UPL being ranked once again as the #1 global crop protection company amongst its peers by Sustainalytics in its 2021 ESG rankings.”

-    Healthy volume growth along with improved realisations across all regions except India
-    High sales return in Kharif and erratic monsoon adversely impacted sales volume in India
-    Robust growth in Latin America propelled by higher herbicide demand and a significant uptick in realizations.
-    North America delivered a strong outperformance led by robust volume and pricing growth. This outperformance was driven by a combination of factors - buoyant commodity prices, constrained supply for key products, favorable channel stock and improved herbicide demand
-    Strong performance in North Europe drove major growth in Europe. Improved demand for BioSolutions also supported the regional performance
-    Despite the supply chain constraints and significant depreciation of Japanese Yen, ROW achieved growth in mid-teens led by the strong performance in APAC, Southern Africa and China

Other developments

-    ‘Bunge’ enters as a strategic partner in ‘Sinagro’ (an associate of UPL), which will help Sinagro to
accelerate its growth plans in Brazil.
-    UPL raised the second tranche of US$ 700 million sustainability linked loan to replace the
acquisition loan at 35bps lower interest rate.
-    For the second year running, UPL was ranked as the #1 agrochemical company globally amongst
its peers for sustainability performance by Sustainalytics in its 2021 ESG rankings.
-     Nurture.farm, successfully completed its ‘crop residue program’ - empowering ~25,000 farmers, covering ~425,000 acres and preventing the release of over 1 million ton of carbon emissions.