Container Corporation of India hosted a conference call on Jan 21, 2022. In the conference call the company was represented by V Kalyana Rama, CMD.

Key takeaways of the call

Volume throughput was up 7% in Q3FY22 and 16% in 9mFY22 driven largely by domestic volume. The Exim volume was up 3% in Q3FY22 despite despite challenges such as container availability etc.

Expect overall volume to cross 4 million TEUs in FY22 compared to 3.64 million achieved in FY21.

Originating volume for Q3FY22 was 646522 TEUs with EXIM stand at 549425 TEUs and Domestic stand at 97097 TEUs.

Have 362 rakes as of now and look to take it to 380 rakes by end of this year. It has added 16 rakes   till now this year all are high capacity rakes. New rakes are 80tonne payload compared to 68 tonnes earlier.

Domestic volume is expected to continue is growth momentum.   The margin in domestic segment is building up in the last 3-4 years.  The company expects end up with 12 million tonnes of domestic volume in FY22 the company have clocked about 8.5 million tonnes of domestic volume in 9mfy22.

Realisation will be at this level in domestic segment.  The bottleneck for domestic volume growth is infrastructure. Once we get required containers and rolling stock the growth will be there.

Cost of empty of running was Rs 72 crore for EXIM Rs 146.76 crore for domestic in 9mfy22.

Lead distance 698 km for EXIM, 1395 km for domestic in 9mfy22.

Guidance – Expect 15% increase in volume for the fiscal; Topline will be touching Rs 7500 crore with PAT expected in excess of Rs 1000 crore for FY22. 

Capex - Already spend more than Rs 525 crore. Full year capex will be about Rs 700 crore.

Rail freight margin for 9mfy22 was about 32% and for quarter also it was about 32-33%. The company is collecting some charges as other operating income. 

Double stack trains in a quarter reach a high of 1000 trains in Q3fy22.  The company operates double stack rakes between Swarupganj and Khatuas, a distance of 550 km. Assured time is the demand trigger for DFC.  The DFC offers more opportunity for double stacking.  The company moves containers from Navaseva to Swarupganj and from there to Khatuas it was double stacked. So for this distance of 550 km there will be increase in margin.

Currently Export volume are good but import volume not good.  Unless industry pick up the import volume will not pick up. Moving lot of empty containers to hinterland to support exports.

Market share of the company in JNPT is 77%.   Expect another  5-6% increase in market share for the company in Mundra port once the bottleneck at Palanpur is sorted out.

To come out with 10000 container tenders.

The company has developed method of moving bulk commodities such as food grain and cement using flexi packs in normal containers. The company has handled 4 lakh tonnes of bulk food grains in containers last year. The company is exploiting movement of cement in bulk through containers.     Cement production is in bulk and consumption in bulk of it is 70% so there is strong growth opportunity provided necessary infrastructure is built.   The company is making efforts to gain business in cement.

Multimodal Logistics park (MMLP) – About 3 MMLP including Dahej and Baroda will be commissioned within current fiscal.   Six more are under construction. Bhalli (goa) the customer working is expected soon.  There is good potential in mmlps.

Discount was given in hinterland direction in case of empty and that is giving outward cargo to ports.