Kamat Hotels turns to ₹5.45 Cr consol. PAT YoY; margins expand, Q2 softens QoQ as guided

Kamat Hotels' consolidated profit swung to ₹5.45 Cr for the quarter ended September 2026, against a ₹2.19 Cr loss in the year-ago quarter, as revenue from operations grew 11.5% YoY to ₹83.73 Cr. The year-ago quarter also carried a ₹2.5 Cr exceptional gain that is absent this quarter; stripping that out, the comparable year-ago loss deepens to roughly ₹4.69 Cr, making the swing to this quarter's clean ₹5.45 Cr profit a sharper turnaround than the reported numbers alone suggest. Standalone PAT was ₹7.11 Cr (EPS ₹2.41) against consolidated PAT of ₹5.45 Cr (EPS ₹1.59, after ₹0.77 Cr attributable to non-controlling interests in subsidiaries including Orchid Hotels Pune and Fort Jadhavgadh). Margins expanded sharply on a YoY basis — operating margin rose to 23.8% from 13.8%, and net margin to 6.3% from -2.9% — but eased from Q1 FY27's 27.2% OPM / 10.4% NPM, with revenue down 7.5% and PAT down 43.8% sequentially. This QoQ softening is consistent with management's own seasonal call on the Q1 FY27 concall that Q1 and Q2 would be soft before an H2 recovery; on that basis the quarter tracks guidance rather than missing it, even though no formal revenue or EBITDA number was ever given. Operating margin at 23.8% also remains roughly 6 points short of management's 2-3 year target of 30% EBITDA margins. No broker previews or consensus estimates for this specific quarter turned up in a search, consistent with thin formal analyst coverage of the stock; vs-street is accordingly unknown rather than a miss. The quarter's standout corporate action was the board's approval, at the same meeting, of up to ₹168 Cr of investment via OCDs/NCDs into wholly-owned subsidiary Orchid Hotels Pune — funding that ties directly to the ~400-key expansion across Gwalior, Dwarka, Dehradun, Nashik, Rishikesh and Mandvi flagged on the prior call. The board also granted 1,78,000 RSUs under a new FY26 ESOP scheme, a minor item with no P&L impact this quarter. No standalone management press release was available to cross-check against the filing. The quarter sets up a test of the H2 recovery call: FY26's full-year consolidated PAT ran at ₹38.55 Cr, so the next two quarters need to outrun this soft Q2 materially to keep that pace intact, with the ₹168 Cr Orchid Hotels Pune capex now a near-term funding commitment to track alongside it.