Cheviot Q1 FY27: revenue +42% YoY but core margin narrows as investment gains lift PAT

Cheviot's standalone Q1 FY27 (quarter ended June 30, 2026) revenue came in at ₹170.55 Cr, up 42.5% YoY from ₹119.72 Cr and up 21.3% QoQ from ₹140.61 Cr. Reported PAT was ₹45.29 Cr (EPS ₹77.53), up 57.7% YoY from ₹28.71 Cr (EPS ₹49.15) and a sharp turnaround from Q4 FY26's ₹9.05 Cr loss. On the surface this reads as a strong quarter. The underlying picture is weaker than the headline PAT suggests. Core operating margin (EBITDA on revenue from operations, excluding other income) fell to 12.36% from 16.60% a year ago, as raw-material (jute) cost rose to 68.7% of revenue from 55.9% in Q1 FY26 (though still below Q4 FY26's 73.1%), even as employee costs (10.0% of revenue vs 16.2%) and other expenses (9.8% vs 15.7%) fell on operating leverage from higher volumes. What lifted the bottom line was Other Income, which jumped to ₹36.39 Cr from ₹18.04 Cr a year ago and reversed Q4 FY26's ₹23.67 Cr fair-value (FVTPL) loss on investments (Note 5) - a swing in the company's investment book, not jute operations. Normalising Other Income back to last year's ₹18 Cr level trims PBT to roughly ₹37 Cr and PAT growth to about +5.5% YoY (versus the reported +57.7%), and net profit margin (PAT/total income, 21.9% reported vs 20.8% a year ago) would actually come in below last year's on that basis. Effective tax rate was 18.3% versus 20.2% a year ago. This is a standalone-only filing - the company reconfirms it has no subsidiary, associate or joint venture as of June 30, 2026 - carrying an un-modified limited-review opinion from Singhi & Co. There is no prior management guidance, concall commentary, or press release on record to check the print against, and no analyst/street estimates were found for this thinly-covered small-cap, so both vsGuidance and vsStreet are unknown; management's own commentary is limited to the standard board-outcome letter, with no qualitative colour beyond the filed numbers. Separately, the board's previously-recommended ₹25/share dividend (record date July 30, 2026) and the 128th AGM (August 6, 2026) remain on the calendar - corporate actions unrelated to this quarter's operating performance.