India's L&T forecasts lower revenue growth, order inflow for FY25

By Kashish Tandon and Hritam Mukherjee

BENGALURU (Reuters) -India's national elections and global geopolitical tensions will hurt Indian engineering company Larsen and Toubro's (L&T) order inflow and revenue in fiscal year 2025, the firm said on Wednesday, after reporting fourth-quarter results that beat analysts' estimates.

"We expect revenue growth to be at around 15% for fiscal year 2025," Shankar Raman, the company's CFO said in a post earnings call.

Indian elections as well as geopolitical tensions in West Asia will affect both order inflow and execution, he said.

L&T had recorded a revenue growth of 21% during fiscal 2024.

Given the variety and scale of orders it receives, L&T's results are often seen as a bellwether for capital expenditure in the Indian economy.

Besides India, the company operates in the Middle East, Africa and South-East Asia.

L&T reported a consolidated net profit of 43.96 billion rupees ($526.5 million) for the January-March quarter, up 10% from last year and beating analysts' estimate of 41.13 billion rupees, as per LSEG data.

Its revenue from operations rose 15% to 670.79 billion rupees in the March quarter, ahead of analysts' expectations of 663.36 billion rupees, with international revenue contributing 45% of the total.

Analysts have flagged that the robust capital expenditure environment, which fuelled L&T's profit for seven straight quarters, is likely to be subdued as government spending tapers ahead of national elections that started mid-April and will go on until early June.

L&T's consolidated order book as of March 31 rose to 4.76 trillion rupees, a 20% rise from a year earlier.

The company's infrastructure segment, which contributes to about half of its total revenue, received orders worth 31.34 billion rupees during the quarter, with international orders contributing 22%.

($1 = 83.4954 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Kashish Tandon, Nandan Mandayam and Hritam Mukherjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Janane Venkatraman, Eileen Soreng and Mrigank Dhaniwala)