Eternal Q1: Blinkit swings to profit, revenue triples YoY; ₹92 Cr PAT trails street

Eternal (formerly Zomato) posted consolidated Q1 FY27 revenue of ₹20,211 Cr, up 182% YoY (₹7,167 Cr) and 17% QoQ, with PAT of ₹92 Cr versus ₹25 Cr a year ago. The headline growth flatters, however: the near-tripling of the top line is largely a gross-up as Blinkit's quick-commerce arm moved from a marketplace-commission model to an inventory-led one — QC revenue jumped to ₹15,664 Cr from ₹2,400 Cr YoY and is now the group's dominant revenue line. On the bottom line, the ₹92 Cr print undershot the street, which (per Business Standard/JM Financial previews) had modelled 11-15x YoY PAT growth — roughly ₹275-375 Cr — on Blinkit's momentum. That is a clear miss on the reported number. The miss, though, is almost entirely a tax artifact rather than operating deterioration. Profit before tax actually rose to ₹272 Cr, up 209% YoY and 19% sequentially; the fall from ₹174 Cr PAT in Q4 came from the effective tax rate spiking to ~66% (₹180 Cr) from ~24% a quarter earlier. Net margin thinned to 0.45% from 0.99% in Q4, though it sits above the year-ago 0.33%. The genuine operating story is Blinkit turning profitable at segment level — a ₹365 Cr result against a ₹42 Cr loss a year ago and ₹265 Cr in Q4 — alongside a steady India food-ordering business (segment result ₹621 Cr, +33% YoY). Going Out remained a drag at −₹61 Cr. The quarter tracks management's Q4 concall framing: 60%+ NOV CAGR in quick commerce over three years, 3,000 dark stores by March, $1bn consolidated adjusted EBITDA by FY29, and an explicit preference for absolute profit growth over margin percentage while reinvesting — so the thin net margin amid expanding QC scale is consistent with that posture, not a contradiction of it. Alongside results, the board approved a ₹35 Cr slump-sale of the small 'Nugget by Zomato' B2B AI-support business (FY26 revenue just ₹7.2 Cr) to wholly-owned subsidiary CTPL, an internal restructuring rather than a material event. The GST overhang persists: demand orders and SCNs totalling ₹447 Cr on GST on delivery charges are being contested, flagged by Deloitte as an emphasis-of-matter. No management press release was captured in our records for this filing, so this read rests on the filed statements and the prior concall guidance. The standalone entity — housing the food-ordering business plus investment income — reported PAT of ₹585 Cr on ₹3,349 Cr revenue (EPS ₹0.64), buoyed by ₹602 Cr of other income; that figure tells a materially different story from the ₹92 Cr consolidated PAT and should not be read as the group's result.