Multibagger in sugar sector - Sakthi sugar

We are often too engrossed in finding unique companies which could become multibaggers. As a result what we miss out on are companies which are there in front of us shouting out that they are multibaggers but we do not believe them.


One such company is Sakthi sugar.
Current price : Rs 94
Price target : Rs 500 for a period of 1 year

Let me get to the numbers straight away.

Company              Last Price  M Cap.(Rs cr)   Sales    Net Profit

Shree Renuka          211.35     6,697.68      1,815.20        92.7   

Balrampur Chini      147.35      3,783.29      1,117.24     193.95

Bajaj Hind              213.20      3,770.59       1,794.35    -50.17

EID Parry               318.90      2,751.08         812.27     691.96

Triveni Engg            104.30      2,689.69      1,596.52     111.52

Bannariamman      1,207.45     1,381.32         711.06      119.83

Dhampur Sugar        119.5         629.84         694.58        3.6 

Andhra Sugar           120.05      325.42           602.9        45.69

Sakthi Sugars             93.5        293.34        1,172.48     -79.55


The sales turnover, net profit and total assets figure is as per the last annual accounts whereas the last price and market cap is as on 6th November 2009. The last annual accounts for Sakthi sugar was for a period of 18 months ended Dec 08.

Lets look at the performance of the company since then which is a period of 9 months.

                                                   9 months                 Annualised

Total income (Rs crore)                 924.68                        1,233

Net Profit (Rs crore)                          97.4                          130

No of shares (Rs crore)                   3.137                        3.137

EPS in Rs                                        31.05                        41.40



Lets look at its comparative position against the performance this year.

For a company which is going to have a turnover more than Rs 1200 crores and a net profit of Rs 130 crores the market cap is only Rs 294 crores. Surprised. So was I. And if you look at the difference between the marketcaps of Sakthi and its peers the astonishment only grows. It should be a 5 bagger if not more.

Lets now look at Sakthi from the view of its profitability going forward.

That there is a likely to be a shortage of sugar in the near future is now common knowledge and the price of sugar is likely to be in the range of Rs 35 to 50 as per different estimates. So every sugar company is going to do well. However Sakthi should do better than its peers because of the following reasons.

1) Unlike in UP the buying of cane is not so much politicized in Tamil Nadu

2) Sakthi is also a refiner and so can continue producing sugar all throughout the year. Even when the crushing season ends in UP and Maharastra. This it can do by using the imported raw sugar.

3) This bring us to the question of how much imported raw sugar is available to Sakthi and at what price. According to news on the web it has contracted for 90 lac bags of raw sugar (90 crore kgs) at an approx price of Rs 20 per kg. Out of this only 100000 kg has been used by Sakthi sugar till September 2009. (See interview of MD – Sakthi sugar to verify facts)

4) Assuming a conversion cost of Rs 5 per kg and a sale price of Rs 31 the maths becomes quite simple. That is a whopping Rs 540 crores profit from the processing of raw sugar itself over the next 18 months. And it also has crushing capacity of 18500 tonnes per day plus income from power generations and alchohol. Huge is what you are thinking. Yes you are right. It is huge.

Lets look at some other developments and its impact.

a) The auditors have pointed out non provision of interest of 56 crores for the period of 9 months to which the company states that it has not provided for the same since it has gone through Corporate debt restricting process.

Impact

The interest is likely to be a reduced amount and in light of what has been discussed above should not be of any problem to the company.

b) The company is issuing and allotting equity shares by conversion of FCCBs.

Impact

This is likely to reduce the EPS of the company but at the same time it is going to bring down the debt levels also. A huge positive for the company.

In light of all the discussion the share prices of Sakthi seems very very undervalued. As a matter of fact during the last sugar cycle with even lower profitability than now the price of Sakthi was above the Rs 200 mark. So anything less than Rs 500 is just not on. Atleast a 5 bagger is what sakthi is.

Happy investing