Mudar Pathreya's picks: 7 eye-catching stocks

From a jute company to a paper mill to a pharma company, these companies seem to have turned around with their superb quarterly numbers, says Mudar Pathreya.

Kopran

There was a time when we used to love this pharma company. Thereafter, the company lost the plot and fell off our radar.

The last quarter results were a pleasant surprise, quite like Lazarus emerging from the dead with "Hey guys, I am back!"

Profit before depreciation and tax has improved sequentially across the last four quarters: Rs 4.87 crore to Rs 7.08 crore to Rs 11.86 crore to Rs 14.91 crore.

The small bone I have to pick is a decline in interest cover in the last quarter to a shade below 4, but I am going to be angel's advocate in the expectation that this aberration is temporary.

Gloster

A Kolkata-based jute company with a difference.

Wonder why all those who keep talking of "the sun rising again in the east" never refer to this company?

Reported a Rs 76 crore increase in revenues in 2016-2017 and a PBDT (profit before depreciation and tax) increase of Rs 32 crore.

Top line crossed Rs 503 crore (when was the last time you saw a jute company report more than Rs 500 crore in top line?), interest outflow declined and interest cover increased to more than 20x.

Equity of Rs 10.47 crore (Rs 10 face value). Wish there was a larger float.

KEC International

There must be something to be said about a company whose revenues increase a mere Rs 45 crore in 2016-2017 but whose pre-tax profit increases by Rs 172 crore.

The pre-tax bottom line in the last quarter of 2016-2017 of Rs 208 crore was 45 per cent of the annual (which could be due to bunching of completed contracts during that quarter) one.

But one needs to hand it to this company for doing in a single year what normally would take companies a few years.

Weizmann Forex

The company has virtually reinvented itself in the last four quarters: PBIDT (profit before interest, depreciation and tax) moving from Rs 4.24 crore to Rs 9.34 crore to Rs 14.84 crore to Rs 19.67 crore.

Interest cover of nearly nine.

The kind of asset-light company that can create wealth for shareholders if the company merely sustains this quarterly growth momentum.

Kuantum Papers

Ebidta (earnings before interest, depreciation, tax and amortisation) for the last four quarters increased from Rs 26 crore to Rs 27.4 crore to Rs 29 crore to Rs 37 crore.

Interest during the first quarter was Rs 4.75 crore; interest in the last quarter was the same. Wow.

Ballarpur Industries

Alas poor Yorick, I knew him, well.

The last quarter's consolidated numbers: Total income of Rs 412 crore, net loss before exceptional items Rs 404 crore.

It is an irony that after years you have the paper industry reporting handsome profits and the country's largest paper manufacturer hits an iceberg.

Sundram Fasteners

I bow to thee O Suresh Krishna! Thy company has reported eye-popping results.

Top line increased Rs 10 crore to Rs 3,545 crore; pre-tax bottom line strengthened by Rs 204 crore to Rs 461 crore.

It would be stupid writing anything more after this.

Mudar Pathreya is a stock market writer, tracking corporate earnings and investor psychology to gauge where markets are not headed.