Unilever India posts 14.7% net profit

India's biggest consumer goods maker Hindustan Unilever, the local unit of giant Anglo-Dutch Unilever, announced Monday a surprise 14.7 percent rise in net profit for the January-March quarter.

The firm said net profit came in at Rs 7.87 billion ($145 million) in the final three months of the fiscal year, from Rs 6.86 billion a year earlier. Expectations had been for a Rs 7.5 billion profit.

The company's sales -- watched by analysts as an indicator of Indian consumer demand in the face of a sharp slowdown in economic growth -- rose 12.4 percent to Rs 63.6 billion.

"In a challenging environment, we delivered broad-based competitive growth and margin improvement," company chairman Harish Manwani said.

The result saw shares in Hindustan Unilever (HUL), whose parent is the world's second-largest consumer goods firm, jump as much as 5.9 percent to a high of Rs 492.6.

AFP