Stove Kraft Q2 FY27: Consol PAT +36% YoY to ₹29 Cr as margins expand on festive demand

Stove Kraft's Q2 FY27 (quarter ended September 30, 2026) consolidated PAT rose 35.7% YoY to ₹28.98 Cr (₹21.36 Cr a year ago) on revenue of ₹584.67 Cr, up 23.2% YoY. Profit grew materially faster than revenue, a sign of margin expansion rather than pure volume pass-through. On a QoQ basis PAT is up a sharp 69.9% and revenue 21.7% — a seasonal swing typical of a festive (Diwali) quarter for a kitchen-appliance maker, and should be read in that context rather than as a sequential acceleration signal. Standalone PAT of ₹29.16 Cr and consolidated PAT of ₹28.98 Cr differ by under 1%; the gap is just the nascent China subsidiary/JV, immaterial to the quarter's story. The expansion shows up across the P&L: net margin improved to 4.98% from 4.53% a year ago and 3.55% last quarter; EBITDA margin (PBT + finance costs + depreciation, on revenue from operations) rose to ~12.5% from ~12.0% YoY and ~11.2% QoQ. Gross margin — revenue less materials, traded-goods cost and inventory movement — widened to ~39.6% from ~38.5% a year ago, a gain of about 1.1 percentage points that just clears management's own 'at least 1% YoY' gross-margin target set on the Q1 FY27 call. No exceptional or one-off items appear on either period's P&L, so the YoY comparison is clean and needs no adjustment. Against the guidance management laid out on the Q1 FY27 call — revenue growth of 15%+ for the full year — this quarter and H1 FY27 (revenue ₹1,065.25 Cr, +30.8% YoY; PAT ₹46.03 Cr, +44.8% YoY) are both running well ahead of that bar. The EBITDA-margin goal (14-15% within 2-3 years, versus an 11% baseline) is being approached gradually rather than met outright — this quarter's ~12.5% is a further step up, consistent with the stated trajectory. Management's segment-specific targets (ICT contribution, non-induction category growth) cannot be verified from this filing since the company discloses only one reportable segment. No Q2 FY27-specific street/consensus preview turned up in public searches to grade this print against, so vsStreet is marked unknown rather than guessed. Corporate activity this quarter was mostly structural: the board approved an SBLC for, and the company capitalised, its new wholly-owned China subsidiary Guangzhou Jiawo Import & Export (which has in turn taken a 50% JV stake in Yushan Wositou New Materials) — both still at nil revenue and immaterial to the Group's ₹1,525 Cr balance sheet. Separately, the September 11 AGM approved a ₹3.50/share dividend, unconnected to this quarter's operating numbers. The inventory build (+54.7% since March 2026 to ₹556.84 Cr) and receivables build (+43.9% to ₹165.48 Cr), funded by ₹103.5 Cr of incremental short-term borrowing, point to a deliberate stock-up for the festive season rather than a demand problem — operating cash flow for H1 fell to ₹39.85 Cr from ₹107.41 Cr a year earlier on this working-capital swing. The next checkpoints are whether H2 sell-through converts that inventory back to cash, and whether the EBITDA margin keeps closing the gap to management's 14-15% multi-year target.