IRB Infra shares jump 5% on strong toll collections

Shares of IRB Infrastructure Developers (IRB Infra) surged in Tuesday's trade after the company provided a strong business and collection update for the month of September 2023 on the year-on-year (YoY) basis through an exchange filing.

IRB Infra, its wholly owned subsidiaries and its joint ventures reported a jump of more than 28 per cent on YoY basis in the toll collection for the month ended on September 30, 2023. The company clocked a toll collection of Rs 420.95 crore in September 2023, compared to Rs 328.24 crore in the year ago period.

For the entire quarter, July-September 2023 period, toll revenue grew 22 per cent to Rs 1,203 crore compared to Rs 984 crore in the year ago period. For the entire first half of the current fiscal year 2023-24, the toll revenue increased 20 per cent to Rs 2,386 crore from Rs 1,984 crore in the same period last year.

Following the announcement, shares of IRB Infra jumped more than 5 per cent to Rs 32.90 on Tuesday, before giving up partial gains, commanding a total market capitalization of close to Rs 20,000 crore. The scrip had settled at Rs 31.22 in the previous trading session on Monday.

Shares of IRB infra remained majorly flat in the year 2023 so far, while the stock has rallied more than 55 per cent in the last one year and close to 30 per cent in the last six months. The stock has delivered multibagger returns of about 500 per cent from its Covid-19 lows.

The toll revenue growth in the second quarter and the first half of FY24 overall as well, looks very good and much encouraging. Commencement of toll collection on newly added Hyderabad ORR in mid-August, full impact of the same will be visible in the coming quarter, said Amitabh Murarka, Deputy Chief Executive Officer at IRB Infrastructure Developers.

"We are expecting the growth momentum to improve in the second half of the year, in view of the onset festive season and expected start of tolling on Samakhiyali Santalpur BOT Asset in Gujarat in coming days," he added.

IRB Infra is India’s first Integrated multi-national transport infrastructure developer in roads and highways segment. It has an asset base of over Rs70,000 crore in 11 states across the parent company and two InvITs. The 25-year-old player has about 20 per cent share in India’s golden quadrilateral project.

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