Titan sparkles bright

Saturday late evening, Titan published its report for the third quarter performance; a preamble to its earnings which will come later.

The company said that retail sales in jewellery were better than expected at the beginning of the quarter, possibly due to a good wedding season and reasonable inelasticity of wedding jewellery, but growth in Watches and Eyewear were difficult to come by. Sales in all divisions in the second half of December was also impacted to some extent due to forced store closures due to the protests in the North East and in many other parts of the country.

The jewellery segment saw revenue growth at 11%, with retail growth much better at 15% (the base quarter, Q3FY19, had a large institutional order for gold coins of Rs.200 cr).

Its watches and wearables division growth for Q3 was flat compared to previous year. Market for watches itself is estimated to have declined by around 4% due to poor customer sentiment and this led to primary sales to trade and ecommerce channels declining sharply.

The eyewear division’s revenue grew by only 2%, primarily led by heavy competitive activity, lower primary sales to trade channels and the disruption in the second half of December due to the nation-wide protests.

CRISIL has upgraded its rating on the long-term bank facility of the Company to ' AAA/Stable’ from ‘AA+/Positive.'

The stock price has reacted positively to this performance report, with the stock opening Rs.20 higher at Rs.1159.65 and then going on to hit an intraday high at Rs.1170, rising over 2.5%.