Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Rajratan Global Wires Limited Q2 FY 2026 Post Results Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, all the participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Sailesh Raja from B&K Securities. Over to you, sir. Yeah, thanks, Shlok. Good evening, all, and thank you for joining us for Rajratan Global Wires Limited second quarter of FY 2026 earnings call. During this call, from the management side, we'll be hearing from Mr. Sunil Chordia, Chairman and Managing Director, Mr. Yashovardhan, ED of the company, Mr. Pranay Jain, CFO Rajratan Thai, and Mr. Hitesh Jain, CFO Rajratan India. I would now like to turn the call to the Chairman for the opening remarks followed by Q&A. Begin now. Yeah, thank you, Sailesh. Thank you, B&K, for organizing this call. Thank you, all the participants, for your interest in joining the call today. I'm happy to share with you that we have posted good results. We have shown a revenue growth of 20% this quarter. There is a substantial volume growth in this quarter, both in Thailand and in our India business. And led by that growth, we have posted EBITDA, which is close to INR 40 crores in this quarter, and highest-ever sales across 32,000 tons in one quarter. And all this is possible because of our Chennai plant getting more and more approval, and there is a good traction in the global market also for Rajratan to export more in coming quarters. And I think we have left behind the worst quarter, which was last. Going forward, you should be able to see better performance of your company. With this, I'm open to answer your questions. Thank you very much. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone phone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question comes from the line of Sanjay Shah from KSA Securities Private Limited. Please go ahead. Yeah, thank you for the opportunity. Good evening, sir, and congrats on great set of numbers. Sir, continuing to your last sentence about export, can you highlight what was the export volume from Chennai in the first half of 2026, and what is the total target of 2026 and 2027? And what are the primary markets that we are targeting? Yeah, so currently, you know our total export to markets other than India and Thailand is around 2,200-2,300 tons per month, which is also divided into around 1,200 tons from Thailand location and 1,000 tons per month from India. And within India also, roughly, it is 50-50. So we are doing around 500 tons of export from our Chennai location and around 500. And all these decisions are based on the availability of containers, availability of the competitive freight rates, and all this. Yeah. And primarily, the exports are happening in Southeast Asian markets, which are Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, and many more locations in Asia. We continue to export to Europe, which we had developed post-COVID, and we are also exporting quantities to North American market. Yeah. And there is a mix of export from both the locations, from Thailand and India. Yeah. Excellent. Then what we can do in next H2 and next year, sir, export? What are the targets? Yeah, so as you know, we have a setup in America now. We have a setup in Europe. We are shortly engaging more people in the Asian market. Okay. And our plans are to at least reach a total export of around 40,000 tons in the next financial year. That's great, sir. FY 2027. That is the plan we have made. Right, sir. My second question was regarding our realization, which has gone up in India as well as from Thailand, by INR 6-INR 7 per kg in India and by THB 10 per kg, by at least THB 10 per kg in Thailand. Are these sustainable, and what should be the sustainable number you feel which we can do? What are the reasons for this higher realization? So I think I'm not confirming these numbers of higher realization, but yes, this gross margin is sustainable. Okay. There can be some pressure on gross margin if there is a change in the raw material price. Currently, the raw material prices are softer, so we are able to maintain this. Otherwise, there may be a lag of one quarter if there is a sudden change in the raw material price. But we are currently operating at a very competitive market. Okay. So these prices are after factoring in all the competition from other players in the business. Right. In last quarter, only you alluded about the higher imports from China, and both in domestic as well as Thailand. So currently, what is the status and how competitive we are? No. In India, there is not much of import from China. Only a few customers are able to import. But in Thailand, we are competing with Chinese import, and we are profitably competing with them and growing also. Yeah. So in India, new capacity from Tata and other companies are coming up. Yeah. In India, as you know, Tata has also increased capacity. Our other competitor, Aarti Steels, has also increased capacity. And Bansal Wires, they have also put up capacity. But Rajratan being present in this business for a long time, because of our knowledge of this business, our product quality, and our strategic locations, Chennai and Indore, I can say we are ahead of our competition. Yeah. Okay. So price parity is coming near to the competitor? We are getting better or? No. Price differentials are there, depending on the customer. Earlier, we were not selling quantities to the North Indian market, which is a low-price market where approvals are also not required. But with Chennai in operation, a lot of our customers will be fed from Chennai, and we'll have open capacity available in the Indore plant, which will start selling to customers in the west and north of India. Right. Right. So my last question about non-auto business opportunity for bead wire in overseas and domestic market? Yeah, so there are not many opportunities like that. Mainly, we are exporting bead wire only. Okay. Okay. For now, and in India, we are doing some business which is non-tyre business, so that is a constant business we are doing. Okay. I'll come for a few more questions in queue. Thank you very much, sir. Thank you for the time. Yeah. Thank you, Sanjay. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rishab Gang from Sancheti Family Office. Please go ahead. Hello, sir. Thank you for the opportunity. Good set of numbers. I wanted to understand more on how the export volumes are shaping up, especially for the premium customers, right, in the U.S. and Europe. And if you can provide a breakdown of from where we are exporting to the U.S. and Europe. A follow-up on that is I wanted to understand more on the size of opportunity at customer level in the U.S. and Europe, right? So if you can explain for any one customer, names are not needed, in general, how much bead wire they will be consuming per annum in these geographies, U.S. and Europe, and how much we are supplying them currently, right, to understand what is the potential to grow to supply more premium bead wire to these geographies. Yes, sir. Yeah. I'm afraid I will not be able to give you very specific information, but Yashovardhan will throw some light on this market and opportunity. He was responsible for the global market. Yeah. Yashovardhan? Yeah. Hi. Hi. Yes. So in the last two quarters, we've transitioned into supplying bulk quantity trial lots to many customers. So we were in an approval phase earlier, which has now converted to bulk trial. Eventually, we are hoping that this volume should increase further this year. And the plan that we have for next year's export business is also dependent on these approvals, which has already happened. Just to give you a perspective, one Japanese MNC who we are approved with now in Europe probably buys about 3,000 tons-4,000 tons a month. And there, we have started supplying probably 5%-8% of their requirement. So the headroom at these counters is quite a lot. This is very encouraging, sir. Also, wanted to understand any senior management hire or hires that you have done, especially for the exports, as well as for the Korean customers. So I remember that you mentioned that the volumes were not moving up in some quarters ago. So any actions that we have taken to improve volumes to the Korean customers? To be honest, the action that we've taken is we've shifted our focus to other customers. Korea seems to be slightly over-competitive market, situated very close to China. The logistics cost from China is also very less. And probably we are seeing that those companies, the approval and scaling up is very slow. We are still in discussion with them. It's not that something has stopped, but the kind of trajectory which we were expecting, that has not happened. But contrary to that, we've got that growth trajectory from companies in Europe and America. So probably there are many counterparts that we are working at. Some would be slow, some would be fast, and some we would want to shift our focus from. So that's the plan that we have. I would like to add here that serving to Korean customers was resulting in tougher competition with two Korean multinational companies who supply bead wire to them. Okay. Let me tell you, that is becoming very difficult. That is our learning also in the last two years. Absolutely. That makes sense. For the Indore plant, I think, have we witnessed any volume decline? Because we are shifting more volumes to Chennai, as well as we noted this point that de-bottlenecked the Pithampur plant to seek alternative and more profitable markets. So when we say more profitable markets, what do we mean? Which markets are we supplying from Pithampur? No. When I say more profitable, it doesn't mean only profit in terms of price. We were not able to supply to customers in this part of the country, North India and West, okay, because of non-availability of capacity. So there is no decline in the capacity in Indore. There is a shift in service from which location we are serving. So we were serving big volumes to South Indian customers from Indore, which is now moving to Chennai location, and we'll have capacity available. So we are using that capacity for export and also to service North Indian customers. Yeah. And in our business, more volumes means lower cost of production. So that is where we are confident of keeping our profitability intact in spite of competition and in spite of higher volume to lower-cost customers. Yeah. Absolutely, sir. The 91% Thailand utilization was very encouraging. On Chennai, I wanted to understand, let's say, how much offtake per client has increased, right, because of Chennai being very proximate to them, as well as what is the status on the PLI for Chennai? Did we do 14,000 tons in FY 2025? How is PLI moving for Chennai? Yeah. So volumes are shifting to Chennai-based customers. So I'll say currently, we are supplying 50% of what we were supplying from Indore. So 50% of that quantity has moved to Chennai. So more and more of that will happen. On PLI, we couldn't do 14,000 tons as committed with the PLI agreement. We have done less than that, but we have applied for revision in the production volumes year -on -year. And we are chasing with the department we are representing to the government to allow us change in the year-on-year production targets. And I hope that will happen. But in all our predictions, we are not including PLI as a gain up till now. That will happen only if we get approval of the change in year-on-year production targets. Yeah. So any PLI incentive will be incremental to the margins. So when I asked you about the volumes, let's say we are supplying 100 units to company A, which is near Chennai, right, earlier before Chennai plant was there. So now Chennai plant has come. So how much additional volume have we able to get from customers which are near Chennai? That was my question, increasing volume. If you can illustrate with a number, maybe. Difficult to say. We have grown our business with them. If I compare from my last year, because our understanding with these bigger clients is on an annual basis. So our business with these companies has grown from anywhere from 10%-20% in first three, four, five companies. Yeah. Okay. Just the last question, then I will come back. Then we have planned to offer them some value addition, like we are offering them to keep minimum inventory, and we will take the responsibility of supplying them just in time, which will be possible because we are surrounded with 10 tyre manufacturing locations. All this will take some time. Okay. Yeah. Excellent decision on the location, sir. One question. I've been reading our competitors' investor presentation. They entered into the steel tyre cord. And I read that somewhere it's 20% kind of margin. So I wanted to understand, do we also think about entering into other products which we can sell to tyre companies? And as a percentage of the total tyre cost, do you know? Can you give us some idea on how much of the steel tyre cord constitutes? Yeah. So I'll answer all the three questions. So our back-of-the-envelope calculation doesn't show that it is a 20% margin business. One. Number two, it is a very difficult business. Investments are very high, and the approval cycle is much longer than bead wire. So we will not dare to enter that business without a very, very strong partner, okay, who takes the responsibility of making the right product and getting the approvals quickly. Okay. So that is our plan. So right now, there is nothing such happening in Rajratan that I can tell you about tyre cord. Number two, tyre cord is about 10%-12% of the tyre input, okay, against 3%-4% of bead wire. So yes, consumption is high, and it is a bigger raw material for the tyre industry. Got it. Got it, sir. I have a few more questions. I will come back in the queue. Thank you so much for the opportunity. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Arnav Sakhuja from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead. Mr. Arnav. Yeah. Hi. Thanks for taking my question. So with regards to your other expenses, there was an increase of around 60% year -on -year. So just wanted to understand that a bit from you. Yeah. So these other expenses are related to expenses in Chennai because till last year, we were able to a lot of expenses were capitalized, but we have shown fully commercial plant operating now. So all those expenses have come to P&L. Number two, this also has a lot of freight outward cost for exports we are doing. So around INR 13 crore, INR 11 crore is the freight outward cost. Then there is a higher cost of power and fuel by around INR 9 crores and many more such costs. So there is nothing extraordinary about it. This other manufacturing cost will come down drastically as the volume in Chennai picks up. Yeah. So the cost is not proportionate to the volume right now because Chennai is still operating at lower production. You were mentioning the PLI benefit earlier that basically you applied to the volume division from this PLI perspective. If the PLI benefit comes through, then I mean, could you quantify what the benefit would be? No. As for the agreement with the Ministry of Steel, we are supposed to get 8% of incremental sales every year. Yeah. Just my last question is, could you please give a bit of an outlook into the tyre industry? So I see the tyre industry doing very well. They are also growing, but their growth is 5%-8%, not more than that. And I also see that the tyre industry is able to export also. So the projections they have given us are in that range of growth for next year also. Okay. Thank you for answering my questions. Yeah. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Bhargav from Ambit Asset Management. Please go ahead. Yeah. Good afternoon, sir, and congratulations for a good set of numbers. Sir, my first question is that given that our utilization in Chennai is now closer to 60%, what is the timeline on CapEx for the second phase of expansion? If you can elaborate on that. Yeah. So Bhargav, we have already decided to invest in the balanced CapEx, which is maximum INR 20-INR 25 crores, which will be sufficient to bring the modular machines to increase the capacity to 60,000 tons. We are placing all the orders in a phased manner to reach us in the next one year's time. Some of it will be available for the beginning of the first quarter of the year, and some will be available for the second and third quarter. Because we have an aggressive sales plan from Chennai also, we want to not limit it because of the capacity. Okay. It is a small investment which is required. We have decided to go ahead with this. Okay. Secondly, sir, given that from Chennai, we are closer to the customer location as well as in terms of raw material sourcing also, we are now closer. Is it fair to say that the freight savings once the Chennai plant operates at full-fledged could be about 1.5%-2.5% both inward and outward as a percentage of revenue? Yes. But we are not committing that as an improvement in bottom line entirely. Some of it will have to be passed on because of the competitive market. Okay. But definitely, you can see the glimpses of the right decision we took to be in Chennai. Chennai, on a monthly basis, has become profitable. And going onward, this is to improve further. Sir, in terms of Thailand, given that it's operating at almost 90% utilization and we are making inroads into premium customers as well, any plans to increase capacity there or will use the Chennai facility to target those customers? So when we say Thailand is 91% utilized, we are doing some de-bottlenecking, making some little more investment, doing some more work to increase the capacity by another 10%, which will be possible in the same location. Beyond that, we don't have the space there. Okay. So the next move will be moving from low-priced customers to better-priced customers. That will be the next year when Yashovardhan gets major approvals in multinational countries. The volumes to Chinese companies will reduce, and volumes to those multinationals will increase. So that will benefit the bottom line of the company. So for now, this is the plan, and there is no possibility of increasing capacity further in that location. Understood. And lastly, sir, in the presentation, you mentioned that despite a significant improvement in Thailand in terms of pricing, you expect this to sustain or maybe in a band of about 10-odd percent here and there. So that confidence comes from the fact that you are seeing good visibility from your premium customers. Is that the reason why you are sort of confident on this realization in Thailand sustaining more or less? Yashovardhan or Pranay, you should answer this. Yeah. So like I mentioned, because now a good amount of volume has started going, and the negotiations with premium customers are always annual. So we have a much better visibility with these customers, and the discussion is always for the entire year's business, which we have had for 2025, and now we are in the process to do it for 2026. So the discussions are quite encouraging, and we are confident that these volumes will increase and will sustain. Okay. Understood. One clarification on this: if there is a bilateral trade agreement which happens in the U.S. maybe in the future, will that also include our category, or our category is sort of excluded as of now? Bilateral trade is excluded. Thailand or you mean Thailand? Sorry, sir, I didn't understand. No, Bhargav, this product is excluded. This falls under Section 232. So there is no adverse impact of reciprocal duty. Whatever duties there are across the board for all the countries is there, and it is a little higher on China. So as of today, we don't see any change in the duty structure because of the trade agreements with India or any other country. Sir, [Foreign language] it applies to us also, meaning the penal tariff of 25%? Yeah. 25%. [Foreign language] Okay. But that is across the board for all the countries. Okay. Okay. Great. Thank you very much, and a ll the very best. Yeah. Hello? The next question is from the line of Ritesh Shah from Investec. Please go ahead, sir. Yeah. Hi, sir. Thanks for the opportunity. Sir, my question is, with a five-year view, how should we look at the company? You indicated that we will go ahead with Chennai phase two. I think so that is one. But beyond that, how should we look at the company, sir? Yeah. Ritesh, difficult to talk five-year view in this volatile market. Past [Foreign language] But I can tell you three-year view, which we are very confident that Rajratan will be doing a business of around 190 or 180,000 tons with a top line of close to 2,000 tons. This plan is intact. Okay. Beyond that, maybe we walk a little further and we'll see some visibility. Yeah. Okay. And my second question related to this one. When we say Chennai phase two expansion, what will be the process in securing approvals, basically stabilization of the plant? Will it be as easy as the first one, or is it like we have done all the hard work, phase two expansion won't have any of those hiccups? So those hiccups won't be there if we are expanding in the same location. Okay. So we won't have to go for a new approval. But if we see the market growing that fast, we see the customers' demand, which can absorb doubling the capacity there, we are ready to do that with a very low-cost investment. But as of today, I don't see that happening in maybe three years' time. So three years are too long to predict that. Okay. That's helpful. And sir, my second question was on Thailand operations. I would presume there would be some benefit of Forex in the reported rupees per ton number, the implied number that we see for Thai operations or consol minus standalone. Sir, how should we understand the Forex impact over here? Are there any tailwinds? Or basically, if you look at Thai Baht, it moved both ways during the quarter. And if there are exports out of Thailand, probably in dollar terms, we would have some gains probably over there. So net-net, sir, if you could help us understand how to look at those numbers. Pranay, would you answer this? Or broadly, we are not doing any hedging as of today because we do import from China in dollars, and we export out of Thailand in dollars, and there is a natural hedge available. Whatever foreign currency impact you see of valuation is because of our investment in Thailand, and that relationship is changing. But Pranay, can you say more on this or Ritesh? Sir, apart from Thailand, I agree with you, and this is the only practice which we are following. There is a natural hedging on receivables and payables. But we do monitor if there is something changing related to Forex. We are sometimes taking action, and we are hedging ourselves also if it is really necessary. So Ritesh, very difficult to give projections on foreign currency gains or losses. Yeah. Done. Done. Done. Perfect, sir. Thank you so much for the answers. But Ritesh, the. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Sorry. So the improvement in realization that you see is also because there's some downward trend on the raw material cost. But we are not looking at it as reduction in raw material cost. The idea is, or the actual scenario is that we were able to improve our realization because the proportion of sales to premium customers increased. So that's also one of the major reasons for the realization improving in Thailand. Sure. Sir, I'll just take a third question. Sir, how should we look at the timelines for phase two Chennai expansion and the ramp-up of phase two at Chennai? I already told you we are ordering all the required equipment, and that should be available beginning of the first quarter of next financial year and complete in the second quarter, so next year's plans for Chennai are big, so we need to have the capacity in place. Okay, sir. Good. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Saket Kapoor from Kapoor & Company. Please go ahead. Namaskar, sir, and thank you firstly for the opportunity. Sir, can you please talk about the tonnage from Chennai for Q1 and Q2? Hitesh, will you answer this? You have the numbers. Hello? Yes, sir. Yeah. For Q2, sales tonnage 4768 metric tons. 4768 is for Q2? Yeah. And Q1, 725. And Q1, 2485. 2485. Okay. When we are comparing Q1 versus Q2, there is an incremental 3855 metric tons. So the entire contribution is from the Chennai unit only. Whatever improves. You will see more of it is coming. Okay, sir. Sir, [Foreign language] for the entire year? I missed that tonnage. Around 6,000-7,000 tons for this year. 6,000 to 7,000. Sir, [Foreign language] figure mentioned [Foreign language] tonnage of 180,000 tons that the three-year vision and INR 2,000 crore top line. This is what you mentioned, sir? Just reply to. Close to that, yes. Yeah. Okay. And sir. 180,000 tons of bead wire and other products, maybe 15-20,000 tons. That makes it close to 200,000 tons, and because we are also investing in a wire rope facility, and that will also add 10,000 tons, so [Foreign language]. Okay. I was coming to the wire rope part only, sir. [Foreign language] and how are we progressing? What's the? Yeah. So it will take another six months to complete. We are building up a new building. Machines are already at site, stored in a godown. But we had to make a new building for accommodating all that layout and machines. And we will start production in the first quarter of next financial year. Okay, sir. So when we look at our cash flow, for the first half under the plant machinery and property, we have invested around close to INR 31 crore. So can you quantify where this money has been spent? INR 31 crore, INR 30 crore, 72 lakh? Hitesh? 29 crore in wire rope plant at Pithampur. Some in the balancing equipment in Chennai maybe. Sir, for Pithampur, is it the efficiency one? Can you quantify where this money is? No, no. It's for a new project. It is for the new project. Okay, sir. Can you elaborate slightly more? I'm off the record. What are we setting up and what are the idea? No, we have talked about it in the past also. We are doing a pilot project of wire rope business, which is 10,000 tons per annum capacity. If we are successful in this business, then maybe after two, three years, we really want to invest in a bigger capacity. Yeah. So as of today, because we had the space available, we had the capability, people were available, we decided to put up this in the mother factory at Pithampur. So for longer run and for global market, Indore may not be the right location. But all those decisions we'll take maybe two years from now. Okay. So that entire INR 29 crore attributed towards the wire rope facility, that is what you have asked? Yes. Yeah, more investment is required, which will be in the coming months. Okay, and what will be the total CapEx we have envisaged for this project? INR 70 crores for this project. This is only the plant and machinery part since land is there co-shared by the manager? No, no, no. Total investment is around INR 70 crores, out of which plant and machinery majority of has already come. Okay. So now we need to reinvest in land? No, land is already there. We had our company land. So new building, other infrastructure, power, electricals, material handling, all this will be done now. Okay. Sir, when we look at the realization part, that is trending lower only. So if you could just give some colors for the domestic entity or on a consolidated level also. So just a color on the market and what are we anticipating in terms of realizations going ahead? Yeah. So as I told you, we are working in a competitive market. You see realization lower because the raw material prices have also come down. Okay. So there is a huge correction. Prices of steel products remain softer. So the price of bead wire. But we are happy with this realization, and we have enough plans to improve on our cost to continue generating satisfactory EBITDA number and profitability. Yeah. And last point is on the hello? Hello? Sir? I'm there, sir? Yes. Yes, sir. You can continue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sir, in the cash flow, sir, we see that the net of income tax paid for the first half on a standalone basis is lower than what we paid for the last year's first half. So does that include some regarding the Chennai operation unabsorbed? Actually, Chennai operation depreciation will save us on income tax. Yeah. I'm sorry. Because this year, we'll claim full depreciation on Chennai operation. So the income tax liability will reduce. Will reduce. But going ahead, we will be seeing improvement in the tonnages from the Chennai unit. This is what the roadmap for H2 looks like. Yeah. Sure, sure. Yes. You are right. And, sir, thank you for this very detailed and rich investor presentation that answered and gives the information in the much-needed way. So, please continue with the same, sir, and all the best with the same. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Preet from InCred Capital. Please go ahead. Thank you for the opportunity, sir. Congratulations on the stellar performance. Sir, I would like to know about the realization which we get in India market as well as export market. What would be the difference? We have been continuously telling that we will be supplying to premium customers. Just wanted to know about the realization difference which we get. And also, if we could talk something about EBITDA margin which we make in India and what kind of EBITDA margin we make while we export the same product. So there is a big price differential in the market. Okay. Multinational companies, we get better price. In India also, there are cycle markets where the realization is very low. So the price differential in our product is quite often ranges between plus minus 8%-10%. Okay. So very difficult to tell you. What you see in the profit and loss account or balance sheet is a total number divided by tonnage, okay, which is average price, which may be a misleading figure. In the international market, again, the same scenario. If we are supplying to a Chinese customer, prices are very low. If we are supplying to a European or a North American customer, prices are better. So what you see here is a total average price. Yeah. Very difficult. On EBITDA, we are confident of continuing with the same margin or some improvement from here because there is a lot of improvement in the cost possible with increased tonnage. So our costs are likely to come down substantially in coming months. Part of that will have to be passed on to customer, but there is a likelihood of improvement in the EBITDA margin also. Got it, sir. Sir, I can understand that it would be difficult to mention about the realization exactly. But if you could just tell the ballpark difference between Chinese customer, which are the lowest realization, and the premium customer, which we have started in Europe and North America, what would be the difference of the realization between them, lowest and the? $800-$1,000 or $1,050-$1,000 dollars.