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Tata Steel Ltd
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Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Tata Steel Analyst Call. Please note that this meeting is being recorded. All the attendees' audio and video has been disabled from the back end and will be enabled subsequently.
I would now like to hand the conference over to Ms. Samita Shah. Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.
I can't hear you, Samita.
I was on mute.
Yes.
Yes. Thanks, [indiscernible]. So good morning, good afternoon and good evening to all of you joining us from the West, from India as well as the Far East.
I'm Samita. And I'm delighted on behalf of Tata Steel to welcome you to this call to discuss our results for the first quarter of FY '23.
We have with us our CEO and Managing Director, Mr. T.V. Narendran, who's on the screen beside me. Unfortunately, our ED and CFO, Mr. Koushik Chatterjee, is down with COVID and unable to join this call today, but we will attempt over this 1 hour or so to walk you through our results and explain our performance and obviously answer any questions you may have. We will take questions in audio mode as well as in chat mode.
Before I hand it over to Naren, I just want to remind you that a presentation explaining our performance is on our website. You can refer to it for your convenience. There is a safe harbor clause on Page 2 of the presentation which will cover the entire discussion. Thank you.
And over to you, Naren.
Thanks, Samita. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening to all of you.
As you know, the global economy is facing several macroeconomic headwinds both from inflation and from interest rate hikes and the COVID situation as well and the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Commodity and steel prices have naturally been affected and there's been a sharp correction in prices of both steel and input prices. Indian steel industry also faced similar challenges, which were compounded by the imposition of the 15% export duty midway through the quarter. And all these have weighed down on steel spot spreads, and they've dropped sharply. Despite these multiple headwinds, Tata Steel has delivered a strong performance with improvement in margins, which validates our strategy and business model. And I'll explain some of the reasons to you.
One is our India business which has always been focused on the domestic market, with exports typically accounting for about 10% to 15% of our volume. We've been able to pivot quite successfully into the domestic market, stay focused on the domestic market, where we've built strong relationships. And what I would also like to highlight is, even if you look at the last few years, we've been selling more in the domestic market than anybody else in India. And that has put us in a good position to scale up in India and despite the challenges. So while the export duty did have an impact, we were able to increase our domestic deliveries by about 5% year-on-year basis; and also achieve an NR increase of about INR 5,000, which is slightly lower than what we predicted, but of course, a lot changed since our guidance in -- after the last year's results. In Europe too we delivered a strong performance enabled by long-term contracts and our product mix. So quarter-on-quarter, we continued to improve our performance. And EBITDA was upwards of £600 million, with net realizations higher by about £154 per tonne on a quarter-on-quarter basis.
Looking ahead, the rest of the year will continue to be challenging. Our performance in the second quarter will be impacted by lower net realizations, which will not be fully compensated by the drop in input prices because most of the benefits of the lower coal prices today will flow through towards the end of next quarter. And certainly it will flow through in Q3. We are working on mitigating this mismatch, but the heightened volatility makes it difficult to assess the exact impact. However, we do see a few green shoots which can improve performance certainly in the second half of the year. For one, the COVID restrictions in China have begun to ease, and the -- we expect that some of the pent-up demand will come back. We are already seeing that in the auto sector in China. And the government stimulus, including what they've announced a couple of days back, to help the property markets are expected to drive more stability in the Chinese market.
The second point I want to make is, at today's prices, most Chinese steel companies are losing money, so because coking coal prices [for China in China] are quite high and not comparable to the Australian coking coal prices, as China doesn't buy coking coal from Australia. And hence, there's tremendous pressure on Chinese steel companies either to cut production or to increase prices. In India, steel prices have now stabilized and are at lower levels. And the pent-up demand or the demand which was postponed because steel prices were dropping is slowly coming back. Sectors like automotive continued to do well, and the underlying demand from end users remained strong. And as demand picks up post the monsoon period and an early onset of the festive season, we expect inventory restocking to resume, helping prices move up. And hence while we do expect margins -- margin compression in Q2, we see volume expansion start to happen in Q2. We will start seeing the liquidity improve with inventory translating into sales.
We continue to drive value-accretive growth in India and remain well positioned to benefit from the existing -- from the expected shift in demand dynamics towards the later half of the year. And our 6 million tonne per annum pellet plant from Kalinganagar, already the power has been charged. The equipment is being tested. And it will be commissioned in the next 3 months or so, and that will help us drive further cost savings. The cold rolling mill, also the power has been charged and the equipment has been tested. And the -- what we call the [main] cold rolling mill itself will get started in the next few months. And by the end of the year, we would have commissioned the cold rolling part of it and then we'll commission the galvanizing lines and the annealing lines. The Neelachal Ispat acquisition was completed on 4th of July. And again we -- the plant, which has been shut down for more than 2 years, we expect to start the blast furnaces at least in the next 3 months.
We continue to progress on our sustainability journey and are committed to be net zero by 2045. And multiple initiatives are underway across multiple geographies, aligned with respect to regulatory and operating environment. We are steadily seeing increasing the use of scrap in our steelmaking process in India, including in our integrated sites, as charging more scrap helps us bring down the carbon footprint. We've also started using solar energy for some of our mining activity. We are deploying EV trucks for short-distance repetitive kind of movement of material. In Kalinganagar phase 2, as we expand, we will again reduce the carbon footprint of the Kalinganagar operation because the utilities, et cetera and all other areas will have a larger denominator to deal with in terms of larger production. Tata Steel Europe is working on a transition to green steel both in -- different strategies in both Netherlands and in the U.K.
Before I hand over to Samita to take us through the financials, I also will comment a bit on talent, which is sometimes an underappreciated part of Tata Steel. I think we are very proud of the talent that we have. And some of the quality of talent is reflected in the results that we delivered. Tata Steel has always invested in nurturing talent. In fact, in many ways, we've also been a sort of a feeder for manufacturing industry -- metals and mining and manufacturing industry in India with many of our alumni occupying leadership positions in many companies. In recent times, we've also tried to broad base our talent. We've made several concentrated efforts to structurally also make Tata Steel more agile, diverse and inclusive and a more engaging place for the talent of the future. And we've adopted an agile way of working to fast pace some of our long-term projects; and also brought in a lot of flexibility on work-from-home policies, for instance, which continues even beyond COVID.
We were the first mine in India to deploy fully women in all shifts. Till recently, legislation in India did not allow that. And we have also deployed women employees across the value chain. We've also onboarded more than 100 people from the transgender community, and we are working on integrating them with Tata Steel, into Tata Steel, and society at large.
With that, I hand over to Samita for her comments before we deal with the questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Naren.
Tata Steel has continued to perform across geographies despite the complex global operating environment. Our consolidated revenues for the quarter stood at INR 63,430 crores and were up 19% on Y-o-Y basis, with higher [per tonne] realizations in both India and Europe. Our consolidated EBITDA stood at INR 15,047 crores, translating to an EBITDA margin of 24%.
Our adjusted EBITDA, which excludes the FX impact, stood at INR 14,348 crores and increased to INR 21,661 per tonne on a Q-on-Q basis. This was despite the increase in raw material costs both in Europe and India.
Just coming to Tata Steel standalone. Our raw material costs for the quarter increased to INR 17,336 crores primarily due to an increase in coking coal consumption costs by $112 per tonne of coal. Royalty increased by 2,005 crores, as there is a lag in the [IPM] declared prices on which royalty is computed and the decline in spot prices of iron ore since May is yet to reflect in those prices. ForEx gains for the quarter stood at 1,312 crores. This is for Tata Steel standalone again. And excluding this, the adjusted EBITDA stood at INR 8,304 crores, which translates to a per tonne EBITDA of INR 21,326 crores.
At Tata Steel Europe, raw material costs for the quarter also increased to 1.148 million due to an increase in coking coal consumption costs by around £84 per tonne. Energy expenses declined due to a moderation in gas prices. And we also received a government rebate in U.K. for payments made for power expenses in the previous month. This was partly offset by slightly higher costs related to freight and handling. Overall, total costs were up by £43 per tonne, while steel realization was higher by £154 per tonne, leading to a significant uptick of £111 in EBITDA per tonne which translated to a best-ever quarterly performance of £621 million.
Taxes for the quarter, this is for the consolidated entity, was INR 4,192 crores and were up on a quarter-on-quarter basis mainly due to deferred tax component in Europe. Excluding the noncash deferred tax component, taxes are in line with profitability.
Moving on. The volatility in commodity prices and the [initiate] impact of export duty has led to an increase in working capital on a Q-on-Q basis primarily due to an increase in both raw material and finished and semifinished goods inventory. As the fourth quarter is a seasonally strong one, there is a drawdown of stocks and a subsequent quarter usually witnesses some buildup. In Q1, this trend coincided with the imposition of the export duty and the higher coking coal consumption cost, which has led to an increase in overall inventory position over the normalized levels. Of late, coking coal prices have moderated to below 250 per tonne levels. And this should begin to fully reflect in the P&L or our working capital from the later part of the second quarter in India and more like Q3 in Europe. This, coupled with our cost improvement and other initiatives, should result in a normalization of working capital in the second half of FY '23.
Despite this working capital stress, we were able to keep our net debt at INR 54,504 crores. And our financial metrics continue to be well within investment-grade levels. Our net debt-to-EBITDA is 0.87x, while our net debt-to-equity is below 0.5x. We remain committed to our annual deleveraging target of $1 billion per year, in line with our capital allocation policy of prioritizing reduction in debt.
Capital expenditure for the quarter stood at INR 2,725 crores, and we maintain our annual guidance of 12,000 crores for the year. Our group liquidity is strong. We ended the quarter with a cash balance of over INR 28,000 crores. Part of this cash built up was to fund the acquisition of NINL, which we have completed early July, and we are now back to our normalized cash levels.
With this, we will end here and open the call for questions. Over to you, [Kinchuk].
We will now begin with the question-and-answer session. We will be taking questions on audio and chat. [Operator Instructions] We have our first question. The first question is from Satyadeep Jain from AMBIT Capital.
First question is on energy. What kind of rebate did you get in U.K. in this quarter? And what kind of -- you also have the hedge position for energy. How do we look at energy cost inflation for you possibly in both Netherlands and U.K. over the next few quarters? That's the first question.
Yes. So Satyadeep, on the specific what is the benefit we got out of -- from the government on energy, I'll let Samita come back to you with a specific number, but overall, yes, energy inflation is a concern. If I look at what we are going to spend this year compared to what we were spending maybe 2 years back, it's about 3x, okay, simply because of gas prices going up. We've been insulated quite a bit from the volatility because we typically hedge 75% of our exposure. And that's why we've not had the -- we are a bit insulated from the volatility that you see. Going forward, we do expect things to settle a bit because, as you know, Europe is doing, taking a number of actions to reduce its dependence on Russian gas, including starting up some of the coal plants, coal-powered plants, also investing significantly in LNG. So there are multiple actions being taken. And more specifically if I look at Netherlands, they have already fulfilled the requirement of EU for the countries to consume 15% less gas than they normally do. And so there is no business risk to us from lower gas availability, but the inflationary pressures are something which we are watching. That also is reflected in the higher spreads than you normally see because everyone is facing the same challenge. So costs in Europe are certainly higher than what we've seen in the past. Samita, you want to add anything? I think we've lost Samita.
Just while we're waiting for her, one follow-up on that. So you are basically saying that the entire energy exposure is hedged 75% for the rest of the year. Are you somewhat hedged for FY -- for the next year also?
No. I mean typically it's for the next couple of quarters that we are fully hedged. So we continue to work that hedge, and that's about 25%. So we're not hedged for the next year.
Okay. So second question was on so Tata Steel has also been embarking on the entire transformation program. The -- I'm talking about the European business.
Yes.
Given the European -- the U.K. entity has grant from the U.K. government [on] energy compensation, the transformation program, where does Tata Steel Europe stand on the European cost curve now where -- versus where it was a few years ago? And structurally the challenge with Tata Steel Europe historically was, in a significant downturn, there was an EBITDA loss at the P&L level. Structurally what has changed for the European steel industry that could provide us some confidence that there has been a margin uplift compared to historical levels?
And related to that would be, given the gas prices where they are, could the -- could there be delay in the entire push to DRI? I believe that the transition to hydrogen-based DRI for many of the companies is not a straightforward transition to DRI -- hydrogen-based DRI. It's partly starting with natural gas and then moving to hydrogen, but given where gas prices are, could we be looking at [a delay in the entire] transition to DRI, EAFs?
Yes. So certainly the -- in terms of the cost position of the European business, I will separate out the Netherlands and the U.K. Netherlands has always been well positioned, as far as the European steel producers are concerned. It's always been on the left end of the cost curve, which means it's been one of the lowest-cost producers in Europe and continues to occupy the position, but having said that, we continue to take out costs and drive more efficiency. That is one part because we are also conscious that there's inflationary pressures not just on gas prices but also on labor costs, right? So that's something that we will continue to work on. Second thing which we are doing in Europe is, apart from costs, we're continuously investing to improve our product mix. So Netherlands, the STAR program which we've been running with for the last few years is about enriching the product mix serving the more high-end customers, et cetera. We probably have one of the best steelmaking shops in Europe now with the investments that we've made. So there's a product mix enrichment also going on to supplement our competitive cost position.
As far as U.K. is concerned, it is somewhere in the middle of the cost curve for the European steel industry because there are some structural issues. The U.K. plant [indiscernible] plant like the Netherlands plant. It doesn't have a pellet plant. It needs to buy [some coke]. The gas balance is not perfect. So there are some challenges because of which the U.K. business [will always] be about €20 to €30 per tonne or €40 per tonne in a worse cost position than Netherlands on a comparable basis. So -- and one of the issues there is also the energy cost -- in U.K. is pricing energy costs. I am talking of electricity in the continent. So these are issues we are talking to the government. As far as the transition is concerned, yes, in Netherlands the plan is to move from blast furnace coal-based to gas-based, DRI to hydrogen. What you're saying, yes, is something which has been in discussion across Europe and in Netherlands, but the general view is that, in the next year or 2, Europe will have options beyond Russia, as far as gas supply is concerned, so gas availability is not expected to be a concern. Gas prices are also expected to settle over the next 2, 3 years by the time we shift to gas-based production, so it's something which we watch very carefully, but as of now it has not impacted our transition plans.
One of the questions was also on the...
Yes. So the cost takeouts continue. Typically we target about €100 million to €150 million of cost takeouts, both in Netherlands and in U.K., based on our – the cost takeout programs that we run every year, like in India as well. So that continues. That continues, and to some extent, that is helping us offset some of the inflationary pressures.
The next question is from Amit Dixit of Edelweiss. Amit, we are unable to hear you. We request you to please send in your -- yes, Amit, please go ahead.
Yes, yes. Sorry. I'm unable to kind of hear you too. So yes, I have a couple of questions. The first one is on again continuing from Satyadeep's question. So given the significant thrust on sustainability in Europe, in particular both mainland as well as U.K. And it has been highlighted umpteenth number of times in our annual report as well that we are looking for to meet the elevated sustainability standards of Europe we will be investing over there. Now in the past we have heard that most of this CapEx would be funded out of the cash flow that Netherlands operations generate. And in U.K. possibly you will be dependent on government support, so is it possible to split both the aspects in how much CapEx we are spending over -- I mean, we are targeting to spend over next few years in Europe on sustainability? And how much of it will be funded from the cash flow generated from the business? And how much of it is likely to be funded from Tata Steel stand-alone business?
Yes. So Amit, I'll answer part of the question because on the exact CapEx we are still doing some detailing. So let me -- so a few things first, right? Firstly, strategy and approach is different for Netherlands and for U.K. So when you look at Netherlands, like I said, transition plan is when the blast furnaces -- not the one which is due for relining in February next year but the one -- the next one which comes to relining after that. When the blast furnaces come up for relining , we will close them down and start building the gas-based DRI facilities. That's the plan, but we are working out the details of the business case, et cetera. The expectation is that we should build a corpus from the Tata Steel Netherlands cash flows to try and ensure that the transition is done by the cash flows generated from Netherlands and with some support from the government in Netherlands. So that's a plan. So [indiscernible] it is not dependent on support from India. That's as far as Netherlands is concerned.
As far as U.K. is concerned, the cash flows in U.K. will never be able to support the CapEx that is required for the transition. In U.K., the transition is different because, U.K., the transition is more towards leveraging the scrap which is available in U.K. because U.K. is an exporter of scrap. So there is an opportunity to leverage that scrap which is available in U.K. and convert it into steel, as long as there is support from the government to help with this transition, the CapEx required for the transition, as well as some policy support because energy costs in U.K. are twice the energy costs in Europe. So the U.K. transition is very dependent on the kind of support we can get from the government because again the philosophy is we want to minimize the impact on the standalone or the parent.
Okay. And the second question is essentially that we have split Tata Steel Netherlands and Tata Steel U.K. business in October. Is it a thought process that we will get separate financial statements of these entities, I mean, going forward in quarterly, I mean, as you mentione to Tata Steel Europe. Is there a possibility of the same?
Samita...
Amit, maybe I can answer that, yes. So I understand where you’re coming from, that you’re looking for more clarity between the 2 entities. I think for us it’s actually trying to strike a balance between the amount of sort of complexity of the data we put forth in the public domain and with the need for making sure you understand the performance. So we are already doing U.S. dollars. We are doing pounds and we are doing INR, so it’s a little bit of that. We do track the businesses separately and we do comment a lot on the businesses for your understanding eparateely. We will evaluate this, but frankly, from our’perspective, it's more in terms of just trying to reduce the noise in the system. It’s really about that, but we will – we hear what you are saying and we will come back and see if that is possible.
The next question is from Vishal Chandak of Motilal Oswal.
So sir, just a couple of questions. I don't know if I missed it on your opening comments. My first question was with regard to your steel contracts that are getting repriced in Europe, so can you please help us? How much of the proportion of these contracts are getting reset? And typically at what prices you are looking at.
So Vishal, about 30% of our contracts in Europe are annual contracts. So there's no reset there. That continues till December. The balance, some of it has already been reset, which are quarterly and monthly, et cetera. And there's 30% which are half yearly, which is the ones which will get reset during this quarter. So that's a conversation which is going on. Obviously we expect to finish somewhere between the spot prices and the long-term contract prices because, when we reset these contracts, we are going to hold these prices for the next 6 months, so obviously the price that we settle on will factor the way we see the next 6 months and the way our customers see the next 6 months. So that's as specific as I can get without being more specific, yes.
That is useful, sir. Just following up on this contract repricing. We have seen Tata Steel Europe reporting phenomenal numbers. No one ever expected Tata Steel Europe to really beat India stand-alone or parent entity numbers. That's something which I think we [never expected], but the question remains what is the sustainable number. We have seen Tata Steel Europe reporting as low as in triple-digit negative EBITDA numbers also, in terms of less than $100 per tonne of EBITDA. And we have seen [$370] also, so how do we look at -- strike a balance? And then what is a sustainable number?
Yes. So Vishal, let me put it this way. I think the Netherlands business has always been EBITDA positive, has always been cash positive, okay? It may not be so visible because we've always reported it as TSE. So the Netherlands business has always been a strong business, slipped in between a bit here and there, but I think fundamentally it's a strong business. The U.K. business was the one which was fragile. And in the past, the U.K. business was 3x the size of today. It was 10 million tonnes. Today, it is 3 million tonnes, right? So today, the U.K. business, which is the most fragile part of our business, is only 10% of Tata Steel's operations, whereas at one point in time it was 40%, right? So that's a big structural change in Tata Steel, right? So that is one point. Second point is traditionally the spreads you would look at was about €225 per tonne, right? That used to be the spread, average spread. That has changed. That has changed because costs in Europe have changed for everyone, not just for Tata Steel but for everyone, whether it's gas prices, inflationary pressures on kind of employee costs, et cetera. So today, the spreads are -- if you see the spreads, it went up to over €600. Today, it's maybe in the €500 to €600 range, right? We don't see it coming down to the €225 that we've seen in the past, okay? So it will be somewhere in between.
So we do expect spreads in Europe to be higher than what we've seen traditionally because everyone's costs have gone up. In addition, everyone is investing or at least planning to invest in the transition to green. And on top of that, Europe is going to have a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism. Exports from Russia, which was a big threat, is no longer such a big issue. So for multiple -- and there are quotas for imports coming in from all other countries. So I think we do see spreads and prices in Europe to be higher than what we've traditionally seen, which will help all the businesses, including us. So our job is to continue to be one of the most efficient in Europe so that Tata Steel Netherlands at least can deliver industry-leading numbers.
U.K. is a slightly different problem. Again, in U.K. we are seeing that, the government, as part of its efforts, or the government which will come or the government which was there in the past, it's trying to revive the British economy and is taking a number of steps to ensure that manufacturing activity in the U.K. continues to be strong post Brexit. As you saw, there were some actions taken more recently on restricting imports in the U.K., so -- but there in U.K., as we've said before, we do need some support from the government to sustain this business over the long term. So I do expect going forward certainly better performances than we've seen in the past. May not be what you saw in the last quarter but certainly better than what you've seen in the past.
Sir, my second question was with respect to again transitioning to the green steel. Now it's already in the public domain. And you've mentioned that the cost of transitioning in U.K. is about £3 billion and it will not be possible for Tata Steel U.K. to do it all on its own. That's known fact, but in terms of Netherlands, how are we looking at it? And if U.K. government doesn't support or the Netherlands government does not support, are we looking at closing these furnaces for good? Or these are good times. Are we still looking at some buyers and selling out in good times for Tata Steel in Europe at least?
So yes. So Vishal, the £3 billion number was put out by media, so I don’t think we have commented on that. So it’s less than that. Let me put it that way. And then we – but the point is, yes, the transition cannot happen in U.K. without policy support and some capital support from the government. I think – and our pitch is that we have supported the business enough over the last 10, 15 years. And we are an important part of the British manufacturing value chain, so while we’ve done a bit, we have submitted to the government that we need some support there. So that’s that part of it. In terms of Netherlands, it’s different. Netherlands, the transition is going to be different. The CapEx is still – the detailed engineering work is being done. Once we do that, we’ll have a better sense of the CapEx. In the meanwhile, the team there is focused on generating the cash flows and the surplus and creating a corpus to help us in the transition. The government is engaging with – is engaged with us and is willing to support us. What is the kind of support is what is being worked out. It will also depend on what our ask is, but I think the business there is in a far better position to manage its transition by itself; and with some support from the – I mean – and with some support from the government if – in policy, if not in cash. And we think we can build a long-term sustainable business there. So that is what is being detailed out. So the – because everyone else in the – in Europe is going through the transition, right; and is getting support from the government, as you can see in Spain, in Germany, et cetera. And we expect that in Netherlands also we will get similar support.
The next question is from Anuj Singla of Bank of America.
So firstly, on the energy security in Europe. Gas, like you mentioned, we have 75% hedged, but I'm more concerned about the availability of gas in the second half of the year. And there are some reports [indiscernible] published where we see shutdowns in the European industrial activity and slowing down and also curtailment of power to industries in Europe. I'd just like to get your thoughts how we are positioned on energy security in the second half. And do we have visibility that we will be able to operate Tata Steel U.K. and Netherlands at optimal utilization levels?
Sure. So Anuj, in U.K. the issue is not so much because U.K. is better prepared than the continent, as far as LNG terminals and everything else is concerned, so I think U.K. doesn't have that much of an issue as the continent has. In the continent, basically EU has advised all the countries to cut down their requirement by about 15% for the second half of the year. Netherlands has already cut down to 20%. Tata Steel Netherlands has also done its planning. There's no disruption or impact on operations because we have options internally to better use our gases that we generate internally. So we are not exposed to this and we are not at risk. The business is not at risk. Gas prices, of course, is an issue. Like I said, 75% is hedged, but the rest of it has had an impact, which has already been factored in. So we don't expect any business risk because of the situation. And I think Netherlands is already at 60% of the storage that it wants to have, and it's rapidly building up its storage of gas to prepare for the winter.
Got it, sir...
Sorry. To continue -- Anuj, yes, sorry. Just to extend that answer: Of course, we are watching to see whether it impacts any of our customers and will that have an impact. That's something we are watching because our customers are spread all over Europe.
Sir, the second question is with regards to the Indian steel pricing outlook, obviously a lot of volatility and weakness after the export duty imposition. Now as for my analysis, we are still at a significant premium versus imports from China, a significant inventory buildup in the last quarter across players, so how -- and this is a seasonally weak period because of monsoons. And we are yet to see domestic demand pick up in a big way. You talked about auto, but I think, when I talk about the broader economy, still I think a lot of hope is there. In the second half, we should see some recovery, so how should we see the Indian steel prices coming in from here? I mean there is one thought that it's bottomed out here given the sharp decline. Do you subscribe to that view? Or you think that there is some more time before you see stability in the Indian domestic steel prices.
So Anuj, I think we are certainly close to the bottom, and I do see things changing for multiple reasons. One is if you look at the fundamentals of demand. Forget the speculative demand. In a volatile market, people will buy more than they need when prices go up and buy less than they need when prices got up, but if you leave that out of the equation and you really look at the fundamental demand, the biggest gain of the last 3 months has been auto. We just come back finally to – the commercial vehicles has come back to levels that we last saw in 2018, right? Passenger is very strong, passenger sales. And all this has a multiplier effect. Second area is construction. Construction, apparently a lot of projects were on hold because, when steel prices went up, 80% of the contracts were on fixed prices and contractors threw up their arms and said that they can’t execute contracts. That problem is solved. Now steel prices are INR 15,000 less than what it was at that point in time, right? And so the expectation is that the government is going to push the execution of these contracts soon after the monsoon, and so we're expecting the de’and to continue to be strong.
In all other sectors, if I look at oil and gas, if I look at the water for all kind of mission, all this, there’s a lot of activity which is coming in. And generally consumer demand has also been reasonably strong, to the extent that in long products actually there was a price increase in the last few weeks. There is another reason for that. In long products, if you look at it, a lot of competition, which is about 50% of the industry, is dependent on thermal coal because they may use DRI. Thermal coal prices are today higher than coking coal prices. We have not seen that in 10 years. And it’s continued – it’s going to continue to face that pressure because Europe is buying coal to run their power plants. So if you see the gap between what we call the secondary producers and primary producers, which used to be about INR 10,000, INR 8,000, today it is INR 2,000, INR 3,000. And the secondary producers have very little room to drop prices because the DRI costs are quite high. It doesn’t make sense to sell DRI below these prices, right? So there is cost pressure continuing on the secondary producers. And I do expect the demand, which has not been as bad as one has seen – because what one has seen is a response to rapidly dropping steel prices than a fundamental compression of demand, right? So that’s why we are expecting that second half will certainly be better. Q3 also, while there will be a margin compression, we expect a volume expansion. We expect to sell more volumes in Q2 than in Q1.
You asked about China. The Chinese companies are losing money at these prices because coking coal prices in China are still over [$500], so something has to give. The Chinese companies are already cutting production. If you see weekly data: Last 3 weeks production has been reducing. Or they have to increase prices because they are losing money. And it’s only the small players in China who are still exporting at prices at which they are losing money. So there is an issue there in China. And I think, over the last 2, 3 days, also with this property fund and various other initiatives, the Chinese government is trying to revive the construction sector. Passenger cars are back to 2.5 million a month, so I think that things are much more balanced today than they were 2 months back or 3 months back.
The next question is from Prashanth KP of Dolat Capital.
Sir, am I audible?
Yes, yes, Prashanth.
Sir, congratulations for a very good set of numbers and not-so-high spike in the net debt as we saw with others. So [indiscernible]. Sir, my questions generally might seem a bit innocent and naive, but the more we think about it, the more it lingers. Sir, if we see from -- in any cycle, from peak to the bottom, steel prices sometimes fall by as much as 60%, 70% also, but then as general -- the general reason attributed today is demand easing. But generally, if you've seen last 50 years, sir, with crude steel, demand has never fallen Y-o-Y more than 5%, ever barring the COVID crisis. Sir, what in our -- what in your view explains this huge volatile piece, sir, apart from the, of course, raw material price movements?
Yes. So Prashanth, that's like -- I'll have to give you a lecture on the steel industry, but I think let me put it this way, right? So one is what you alluded to. A lot of the costs depends on the input costs. See, even when steel prices went up INR 15,000 in March, April, it went up because coking coal moved from $400 to $630, $640. So if we were buying coal, which we were, at $600 at that time, it will have hit us in costs in June. And if you didn't get steel prices at that level, it would have been difficult to sustain, right? So there is a volatility which comes in because of input costs being volatile, and that is one of the drivers of volatility. Second thing is it's a high-fixed-cost industry for those who have integrated steel plants. So when it's a high-fixed-cost industry, if people are covering variable costs, they will continue to produce and particularly if they have government support and which is what has been happening in China, right? So even if they were losing money, people who were expanding and exporting -- which has changed, which was a problem for most of the last decade, but if it is more private sector-driven, you will see people cutting production at some point in time, right? So these are factors beyond demand which exaggerate the impact.
Third is what I mentioned earlier. In a volatile environment, demand gets exaggerated when steel prices are moving up. And demand gets compressed more than real when steel prices are going down because there's always a speculative element. There are traders. Even customers take positions. If they think steel prices are going up and 70% of their costs is steel, then they'll buy more steel than they need; and vice versa the other way around. So that is what adds to the volatility. And it's a globally traded product, so geopolitical issues have a big impact, like we've seen in the last 3 months. So these are the factors which makes it very volatile, but I think the biggest contributor to the volatility over the last 20 years has been the growth of China as both a consumer of steel and a producer of steel because that has a huge impact on everything else. And that has been the change. Earlier, a cycle used to be steel prices going up for 2, 3 years; and coming down for 2, 3 years. Now it is -- you've seen what has happened in the last 6 months. So it's far -- the cyclicality is in shorter cycles.
Understood, sir. And if you'll give an opportunity in future, we'll definitely be glad to meet you and understand the nuances more.
[Got it, yes].
And the second question is, sir, the coking coal prices in China, probably from the Mongolian, and that kind of sources is more of internal, is very high at 500 or something, but then what they're importing from -- or versus another or Australia, is it closer to like the 280, 290 versus 250 CFR for us? Is the understanding correct?
No, no, because – so there was a time, maybe 3 months back, when Australian prices had gone to [600 plus]. China was buying coking coal at [400], right, because they were getting a lot of the Russian coal, et cetera. That has changed now. Russia and Mongolian, and they also buy from the U.S. From the U.S., freight rates are very high. So today, if you look at local prices in China for coking coal, it is upwards of – it’s in the $500 to $600 range. So they still have – that’s why I’m saying the steel companies in China at today’s prices are losing money, and so it doesn’t make sense. And we are seeing that happen. Since early June, they’ve started losing money, so we’ll see the impact of that. So they don’t have the advantage that we have today of buying Australian coal at $230, $240 or even lower.
The next question is from Pinakin Parekh of JPMorgan.
Am I audible?
Yes, yes...
Yes...
Yes. Sir, my first question is can you give us a sense of the expected steel price and coking coal changes in the second quarter in India and Europe.
So on steel price, I want to just say that, yes, it will be lower but without being more specific because things are still pretty dynamic. But yes, it will certainly be lower both in Europe and in India, okay? I don't want to give you a number just yet because I think there are too many moving parts just now. As far as coal is concerned, in India I think we'll see a $40 reduction in consumption cost. Buying, we are buying maybe at $150, $160 lower than what we bought in Q1, but -- on an average, but the consumption will be about $40 lower because the impact of lower coal price will start flowing through in September for us. In Europe, actually we will not see a reduction in coal costs simply because we have a bit more inventory there in the system, so the lower coal price, which is again $150, $160 lower than Q1, will start flowing through in Q3. So in Europe, actually you -- we may see a small increase in coal costs, maybe €20, €30 per tonne increase in the coal consumption cost for Q2 over Q1. So like I said, there will be margin compression in Q2. I am not able to give you a number yet, but there will be volume expansion. We expect to sell at least 0.5 million tonnes more in Q2 than we did in Q1.
Sure. My second question is just moving on to Europe, right? So while you mentioned that Tata Steel does not have energy availability issues, a large part of it, at least in both steel plants, will be met by the coke coal and gases, but there is a very substantial amount of steel production in Europe which is electric arc furnace-based. In your view, what happens to that part of the industry in the next 2 to 3 quarters if the gas supply or the gas availability goes from bad to worse?
No. So there will be -- like I said, one is the -- it depends on whether that country is generating electricity using gas or not. So if you look at in Europe, the most vulnerable economies are more Italy and Germany because, I think, 40% of the gas, the import, is coming from Russia. If you look at France, it's got a lot of nuclear. Spain has many other options as well. So Netherlands again is maybe 20% dependent on Russian gas. So I think the big economies which are going to be impacted are more Germany and Italy. And one needs to see what happens there. Yes, one is gas availability, and two is the energy costs. If you look at an electric arc furnace operation: They don't need so much of gas, but if the grid is dependent on gas for energy, for electricity, then those prices will go up. And if there is a shortage of gas, then there could be a shortage of electricity. The other part, what I mentioned earlier, is also we are watchful of our customers to see if any of our customers are significantly impacted by it, but like I said, we are not directly impacted. We'll be watchful to see indirectly whether the -- we will benefit because supply, as you suggested, may get disrupted; or if there is an impact on demand.
Just my second question and last question on Europe is that, while you did mention that you have -- the company is in talks with both U.K. and Netherlands on the sustainability CapEx, given that Europe has gone back to restarting thermal power plants and energy security will become the dominant theme for them for the next few years, do you see the sustainability CapEx finalization in both the sites to happen over the next 6 to 12 months? Or do you see that, given the evolving geopolitics and the energy security dynamics, any final CapEx decision gets pushed out further?
So that depends on the pace that Europe has set itself to transition to green. There is a point of view which says that, that pace may accelerate because they want to move faster into hydrogen and have less dependent on gas. So that's one way to look at it, in which case you may jump from coal to hydrogen if, for instance, hydrogen is available and cheap and plenty, but our technology choice is about converting to gas which can be substituted with hydrogen. So to that extent, once we are clear that we have gas and/or hydrogen, we can take that call, but I think for now we are not seeing any slowing of the pace. But obviously it depends on how long the conflict continues and what is a larger impact because there is another view that Russia also doesn't want to be seen as totally undependable, as far as gas supply in Europe is concerned. So I think there are multiple angles to it which we are watching, yes.
The next question is from Anupam Gupta of IIFL.
Anupam, we can't hear you.
Anupam -- yes. Anupam, we are unable to hear you. We request you to please send in your question via chat. We will now move on to the next question. The next question we have is from Aishwarya Agrawal of Nippon India. Aishwarya, we are unable to hear you very clearly. If you can speak a little louder. So Aishwarya, I think we are unable to hear you. We request you to please send in your questions via chat. We will now move on to the next question. The next question is from Ashish Kejriwal of Centrum.
Is it audible?
Yes, yes, Ashish.
Sir, my question is, in this quarter, we have seen a realization increase of roughly around INR 8,500 per tonne. So does this realization includes our auto contracts also which we were negotiating earlier?
Not -- are you talking of India?
Yes, India.
Yes. Not all the benefit has come through because the contracts took a long time to kind of -- I would say that it's still not fully concluded because we are discussing Q1 and Q2. So not all the benefits of increase in Q1 has come through.
But sir, any benefits that include? Because the last time, when you guide INR 8,500 increase, that was in mid-May. And in June, we have seen a sharp decline in steel prices, but despite that fact, we are recording this kind of increase. So that's what I'm asking.
Yes. No. So there was benefit of that certainly, but last quarter, the increase you're seeing is we got a lot of increases in April. And then in May, it started from 1st May. Even before the export duty, steel -- market steel prices were softening a bit, but because coal prices were still quite high, we were projecting that the steel prices will remain high. But since then, export duty came. Coal prices started softening, et cetera. So yes, I think there is a little bit of that which will come back, but like I said, I don't want to suggest that Q2 prices will be better than Q1. Q2 prices will be lower than Q1.
Sure. So sir, is it possible to guide us what will be the June exit price as compared to the Q1 average for India?
I will say June exit price is about INR 15,000 below the 1st April price or the early April price. That’s been the swing in the domestic market during the quarter. Let me put it that way.
The next question is from Kirtan Mehta of BOB Capital.
Kirtan Mehta here from BOB Capital Markets. We are starting operations at NINL -- aiming to start operations at NINL over the next 3 months. Would you be able to sort of give us a guidance about how do you see the operations ramping up? And how do you see the costs basically being taken out there? And what are the sort of near-term CapEx to take the plant to their initial operating rate?
Yes. So Kirtan, basically what we are saying is you -- completed the transaction on the 4th of July. Our teams have moved in. The plant was not operational for more than 2 years. We expect to start the blast furnace in the next 3 months, okay? That will allow us to produce pig iron which we can sell or use or whatever, right? The toughest part of the operation that we need to revive is the coke ovens, which have been damaged because it was shut down without taking the precautions that you need to take. So that will take about 6 months, in our view. And we expect that in 6 months we should start the coke ovens, but till such time, we can always supply coke from our other facilities to Neelachal. We've already started the dispatch of iron ore from the Neelachal mines, so the raw material has also started moving to Neelachal. Our -- what we are chasing is the rated capacity is 100,000 tonnes a month. We expect to hit that by March. That's what we are aiming for, right? So next year, we can have a full year, in some sense, of production. The challenge is to get the plant in good shape. I think there's about 400 crores, 500 crores of CapEx planned which will help us in the startup, but more importantly, over the next 3, 4 months, we will develop the plans to expand Neelachal from the 1 million, 1.5 million that we think we can run the existing assets for to about 5 million tonnes. So that will be an expansion plan which we will focus on in the next 6 months, develop the plan, get it cleared with our Board and then try to execute it over the next 3 years or so.
So that's primarily going to be the way we will look at Neelachal. Our teams are already in place. And like we've done in the last few years with the Bhushan Steel or Usha Martin steel business, I think we have a playbook in place for quickly integrating these facilities into our operations and ramping it up to get it -- get the full value of the assets. So that work is going on.
One more question, going back to the Europe. Would it be able to -- possible to sort of indicate the breakeven spread that you need at U.K. and Netherlands operations separately?
So Kirtan, the issue is this breakeven spread is also changing for multiple reasons. Spread is normally looking at raw material price and finished product price, right? And we had traditionally thought the breakeven spread -- I mean, if we get about €225 per tonne, you will be better than breakeven, right? And you will -- that's what we had looked at, but now what is happening is, beyond the spread, the other important elements of costs, for instance, gas price, is not reflected in the spread. So today, we are spending maybe €100 million a year on gas, where earlier we may have been spending €30 million or something like that. I -- it may not be the exact number, but we are spending 3x as we were spending earlier, right? So all this also has an impact on what is the breakeven spread. That's why today the spreads are at around -- I think in U.K. it is in the £400 to £450 range at today's prices. And in Netherlands it's in the 500 to 550 -- or €550 range, €550 to €600 range. So that's the spread now; and the numbers that you see are at those spread levels, if not €50 higher than that. So that's where it is. We expect spreads in Europe to be higher than what it has been in the past for the reasons that I've just described.
Sure. Just to -- suggestion: Would it be possible to sort of give us a sensitivity to some of these indicators like gas price or in terms of the profit that the Europe has in future? It could help us understand these magnitudes or impact on the profitability from the external environment.
Samita can maybe engage with...
Yes. So maybe we can discuss offline, Kirtan. It's a little hard because some of these variables actually, as Naren was explaining, were not major earlier. They are becoming major now. And with the evolving situation, actually one needs to see how it plays out, so it's a little harder, but maybe we can try and give you a better sense.
Our next question is from Ritesh Shah of Investec.
Am I audible?
Yes, yes...
Yes. A couple of questions. First is pertaining to the BSPS scheme. We had a first buy-in transaction over there. If you could provide some rationale for that and the impact it will have on the cash flows. That's the first question.
Samita?
Yes. So Ritesh, as we have said all along, I think our attempt is really to mitigate the risk of ownings to large pension funds because in some sense, when you sort of compare it to the scale of the U.K. operations, it is really large. And the idea of doing this is really diversifying the risks and mitigating the risks, so we have sold a share of the fund. There is really no cash impact because they have taken over the assets as well as the liabilities, that portion of the assets and the liabilities. So there's really no cash impact to us. It's more of managing the fund and managing the risks of the fund. Really that's what it is about.
Any specific quantum you can actually indicate over here on what has been bought in by the insurer?
So we are looking -- I think we have still about 20% or 25%. I can confirm the number to you exactly, but we have sold about 20% to 25% of the fund as of now.
That's correct, yes.
That's quite big. Great. Second question was to Narendran, sir. If I look at last year's balance sheet, there is a significant quantum of cash flow which was actually directly or indirectly moved from India into Tata Steel Global Pte. and eventually into Europe. The number is despite record profitability, what we saw in Europe last year. What I'm trying to understand is to what extent will India directly or indirectly continue to help the European operations.
Yes, Samita, [indiscernible] yes.
So I'll take [indiscernible] -- yes. So Ritesh, it's actually we have not actually transferred any money to Tata Steel Europe for their operations. What we have always said is that the debt which was there at Tata Steel Europe, which was there, which has been there for a long time since the acquisition -- that we are behind that debt and we will service that debt. And what we did during the last year, when we were -- when the cash flows were very strong and as a part of the deleveraging strategy, we have very consciously tried to reduce our foreign currency debt to align it with our asset side of the balance sheet. So as India has been increasing -- the size in India has been increasing. The asset sides in India has been increasing. We wanted to rebalance our liability side and reduce the foreign currency component, so money was sent to repay some of the debt in Europe. And that's what is the flow which you are referring to. So it's gone for reducing debt which is not for the operations of Tata Steel Europe.
Right. Let me rephrase the question. So if we have to put it between the operational cash flows and financing cash flows, I think what you detailed was very categorically on the operational cash flows. If we had to understand the math from a cash flow from financing standpoint, how should one look at it? Because the way in which I look at it as an external guy, consol less stand-alone debt is still upwards of 30,000 crores. And there is no source, credible source, of funds which is there which can actually take care of this quantum of debt, so should we assume that India cash flows will eventually take care of this 30,000 crores of debt, say, over next 3 years, 5 years, 10 years as we pursue our deleveraging story?
Yes. So what you are referring to is we – as you probably know, we have tapped the capital markets previously as well through our subsidiary ABJA, which is again a part of our strategy to widen our investor base and to tap multiple sources of capital so that we are not limited to sources of capital in India or Europe or whatever. The idea was really to build a credit profile and a credit curve for Tata Steel, which has been very successfully done. So a large part of the funds which you are referring to, 30,000 crores, about 20,000 crores of that is in ABJA or is the capital market bond which we did. And that has always been a part of our strategy, that we will be responsible for paying that. Now whether we pay it from Europe, whether we pay it from India, I think that’s more of a tactical call as the situation emerges, but it is we – it is debt on our consolidated balance sheet and we are firmly behind it. I think that we have been very categorical when we raised the funds, when we have been talking to all of you. So that position doesn’t change. Now which entity services it, whether it is Europe, whether it is India, that’s more a quarterly-cash-flow kind of a decision which we will take as it evolves.
I would now like to hand over the conference to Mr. Hriday Nair, Chief, Corporate Finance and Investor Relations, for the chat questions. Over to you, sir.
We can't hear you, Hriday, if you're there.
The first question is on the pellet plant. What kind of cost savings can be anticipated when the pellet plant becomes operational?
Yes. So that depends on the pellet price because the fundamental cost saving is because, when you buy -- when we buy pellets from the market, we are pretty much buying from somebody who's buying iron ore in the market and converting it into pellet, whereas when we have our own pellet plant, we can use our own iron ore where the cost is much lower than the market price [indiscernible]. So I think that is the arbitrage. At one point in time when pellet prices were INR 12,000 or INR 14,000, I think the cost saving was almost 50 crores to 100 crores a month, right, but today the pellet prices are much lower. That is the clear direct saving that we will get. That is one. Second thing is, when you have more pellets, you can improve what we call the agglomerate mix in the blast furnace and bring down our coke rates, which means you can use less coal, which has a big impact on costs as well. So it's a very significant -- there is a significant cost impact, anything from 50 crores to 100 crores a month.
Thank you, sir. The next question is on the cold rolling mill. Can the commissioning of the cold rolling mill drive incremental revenues of 1,100 crores to 1,500 crores per annum?
So typically the normal thumb rule for difference between cold rolled and hot rolled price is about $100 a tonne, okay? So you can do the math on that. That is typically what you would look at in the long term. It fluctuates depending on the dynamics of the hot rolled market and the cold rolled market, but more importantly I think what the cold rolling mill in Kalinganagar is going to bring to our mix is -- first is the fact that the hot rolling mill in Kalinganagar makes up to 2-meter-wide coils. And the cold rolling mill will make up to 1.85-meter-wide cold roll coils, which is 200 mm more than -- wider than what we get out of Jamshedpur. So it opens up new markets for us, particularly in the auto sector. Secondly, the galvanizing line there is really going to be a state-of-the-art galvanizing line. And that again allows us to really open up new segments beyond what we are already catering to. The first galvanizing line that we built in Jamshedpur 20 years back was also a state of the art at that point of time.
Third is the continuous annealing line that we are setting up in Kalinganagar will also help us service the higher tensile grades. In Jamshedpur, with the joint venture Nippon Steel, we are limited to 590 and 780 MPa. This will help us cover that and more, so it gives us a much better product mix. We need to sell less HR in the market, and with the passenger car industry doing quite well, I think our commissioning of the mill will be timed well. So while $100 is more commodity HR to commodity CR, when you look at value-added high-end CR, then the margins or the gaps can be much higher. And it's a 2-million-tonne plant, so you -- that's a math that you need to do, yes.
The next question is on capacity expansion. While we've already discussed a little bit, could you please throw some light on future capacity expansions and when they are expected to come on stream?
Yes. So the immediate focus is on expanding Kalinganagar, completing the expansion of Kalinganagar from 3 million tonnes to 8 million tonnes; and over the next few months, developing the plan to take Neelachal from 1 million tonnes to 5 million tonnes. I think these -- this is the immediate priority, et cetera. After this, there are multiple options. We have an option to expand the Bhushan plant from 5 million tonnes to 10 million tonnes, and we can take Kalinganagar from 8 million tonnes to 13 million tonnes. So we are evaluating both these choices because the advantage with continuing our Kalinganagar expansion beyond 8 million tonnes is that you already have the contractors in place, the crews in place, so without decommissioning them, if the market is strong, balance sheet is good, you can continue phase 3 of Kalinganagar even as you finish phase 2. So that's an advantage with that. With the Bhushan plant, if not to 10 million tonnes, we can also take an interim to 6.5 million tonnes, 7 million tonnes. That's more to do with the balancing of the plant. So we are looking at what is the most economic growth option that we have. The good news is we have multiple options between these 3 sites, so we can exercise whichever option is the most economically suitable option.
Just to add to that. We also have NINL, so that's another option for us to...
Yes. [indiscernible]. So that along with Kalinganagar, Neelachal 1 million tonnes to 5 million tonnes and Kalinganagar 3 million tonnes to 8 million tonnes is the immediate -- next, I mean, immediate focus.
Thank you, sir. The next question is on inventory buildup during the quarter. Inventory buildup of 8,000 crores in this quarter, is it high-cost inventory of finished steel which will be liquidated in the coming quarters at lower realizations? Can you please throw some light on this inventory buildup?
So there are 2 components to it -- or okay, Samita, you want to be more specific in the response? Yes, go ahead.
Sure. So of the total increase which we've had in working capital this quarter, about 2/3 was in India and 1/3 was in Europe. And if you see the price and quantum impact, more than 50%, almost 60%, has been actually on account of price. And the balance has been in account of quantity. It's actually more in terms of raw material and less in terms of finished goods, but we will see some of that raw material, as we said, will flow through in terms of our Q2 costs in terms of as it gets converted into finished goods. And obviously, some of the finished goods inventory, we will sell in Q2. As we mentioned, we are expecting volumes to be higher in Q2, so you should see a lot of the finished goods inventory clear out and the bulk of the raw material inventory clear out in Q2 in India, though in Europe it will be more in Q3.
The next question is on coking coal. There were a couple of media reports suggesting that China is looking to lift the ban on Australian coking coal. Could the differential between China and Australian coking coal come down if the ban is lifted?
Certainly it will have an impact. We've also been hearing this, but 2, 3 months back, the domestic price in China was lower than what was the Australian coking coal price was in the export market. So at that time, the lift of the ban would have worked in our favor because Australian coal prices could have stabilized or come close to the Chinese prices, but now it's the other way around. We'll wait and see, but we also only just heard media reports. I don't think we've seen anything on the ground yet.
The next question is on the management's view on steel export duty. And connected to it is the guidance on EBITDA per tonne in India and Europe for Q2.
So the second part, first. I -- we are not wanting to give a specific guidance. I will just say that there will be a margin compression. Prices will be lower in Q2 than in Q1. Some of that, we will recover because of the costs coming down, particularly in India, by about $40 in terms of coking coal consumption cost. Some of that, on an absolute basis, we'll recover because of volumes in Q2 will be higher than Q1, but overall, yes, there will be margin compression and which will obviously impact the results. I'm not giving a more specific guidance because things are quite volatile. And our job is to see how much of that we can recover in the next 2 months or so, right? So that is one part of it. The second part is -- sorry. What was the...
On export duty...
On export duty...
Yes, export duty, yes, yes. So that's -- while we fully understand the compulsions of bringing that in to kind of put a cap on steel prices and to manage inflation in some sense -- but in the medium to long term, our submission to the government has been India, rightfully so, should be a big exporter of steel. India has the iron ore. Today, there are countries who are importing iron ore and exporting steel, whereas India has the iron ore. Steel investments happen in some of the poorer states in the country, creates jobs far away from urban centers. And there is no reason why India should not export 50 million tonnes or 100 million tonnes of steel because Japan, Korea, all of them export 30 million, 40 million tonnes of steel. China has in the past exported more than 100 million tonnes of steel, so why shouldn't India aspire to be a big exporter of steel when it has got the raw materials that it has and it needs to create the jobs that it needs to create? So I think that's been our submission to the government. And steel capacity should be created, keeping export markets in mind in addition to domestic markets. I think government is kind of supportive of our view. The question is when will they remove the export duty, and we hope it will happen sooner than later.
Thank you, sir. The next question is on the auto demand. IHS global has predicted auto demand for H2 calendar year '22 to be higher than H1. How is that expected to play out for our company?
So that's very positive for us. As you may know, today we have -- along with the Bhushan facilities, we have almost a 55% market share in the auto industry, so when the auto industry does well, it's good for Tata Steel. In auto industry, the steel intensity is highest for commercial vehicles, which did well in Q1; has slowed down a bit just now, the heavy commercial vehicles, medium and heavy commercial vehicles, but we expect that to pick up once the construction activity picks up post monsoon. The light commercial vehicle business is very strong because of the e-commerce companies and warehousing and supply chain investments happening. Passenger is very strong. It's got over the -- it's getting over the challenge of semiconductors. Demand has always been strong and two-wheelers is also recovering. Tractors has been strong. So overall, auto seems to be on a good path to recovery. And we also expect H2 to be better than H1, and that has a positive impact on Tata Steel.
The next question is on the European business. "Request if you can, please, help in clarifying if you are open to selling the Netherlands and U.K. businesses, if buyers are available, irrespective of the price."
I think what we've said, so far, is we are focused on making those business self-sustaining and value accretive. The Netherlands business has already demonstrated that in a big way. U.K. business, like I said, is a bit fragile. What we are more focused on is, yes, our conversations with the governments in the respective countries to see how can we transition into a greener future. So we'll leave it at that, yes.
The next question is on Tata Steel Long Products. How do you see margins and growth for Tata Steel Long Products? Will it also get merged into Tata Steel eventually?
So Tata Steel Long Products had a tough quarter for multiple reasons. One is the auto contracts which were supposed to have been settled were not settled, so they did not get the benefit in the quarter as they had expected on the auto prices, which has since been sorted out, so you will see some of that benefit accruing in Q2. The second part is Tata Steel Long Products also sells sponge iron, so they were impacted by the high thermal coal prices, which started going up. And the third part is, of course, the fact that, once the export duty was levied on iron ore and pellets, et cetera, the DRI prices were also impacted. So there are multiple things which happened which impacted Tata Steel Long Products' Q1 performance, but -- and there is a royalty that they also pay to Tata Steel because of the changes in the MMDR Act last year. On your question on merger: We will, of course, keep looking at various options. That's something which will be discussed and decided at the right time at the Board, but fundamentally we are bullish about the long products business because, as India moves into infrastructure-led growth, long products has a great future. And our product mix today is skewed more in favor of flat products, but I think long products, we believe, has a greater role to play, and hence the investments in Tata Steel Long Products and in Neelachal...
Thank you. The next question is on the domestic markets. We have invested significant amount in downstream capacity and developing markets for branded retail sales. What percentage of domestic volumes would command some kind of brand premium? And would it be fair to assume that our domestic profitability will not be as cyclical as in the past due to these [initiatives]?
Yes. That's the intent. Basically how can we be less vulnerable to the cycles? The more downstream you go, the more insulated you are. There are products that we sell per piece. There are solutions that we sell per square meter or square feet or whatever, so all this takes away the conversation from per tonne and what is the price in China and what is the price somewhere else. So that's the kind of direction. Today, the -- about 20% of our revenues come from what we call B2C businesses where we enjoy a significant premium to our competitors as well as even the same product going -- being sold to the other segment, right? So if Tata Tiscon sold to a housebuilder which is -- has a very different price from Tata Tiscon sold to a construction company which is a B2B business. So I think that's been the focus and we'll continue to develop that. The downstream services and solutions and the B2C business, I mean, we are always looking at it should be at least 25%, 30% of our revenues on -- and our revenues are also growing because the base is increasing. So we'll continue to pursue that, and we believe -- that is one part of the thing. The other part is our exposure to the auto sector and to the oil and gas sector also helps us insulate ourselves from the volatility because those are more accrual-based businesses, quality- and technology-intensive businesses, where there's a lot more stability in terms of prices than in the commodity side.
The next question is on Tata Steel Long Products. Interest cost is higher in Q1 at 341 crores. Is it a one-off, or will this continue every quarter?
A - T.V. Narendran –
It has to do with Neelachal -- Samita?
Yes, yes.
I'll -- yes. So we -- the -- as you know, the acquisition of Neelachal has been done through Tata Steel Long Products. And as a part of that, to finance the acquisition, Tata Steel has actually infused capital into TSLP. As you know, we have -- our shareholding in TSLP is already 75%, so we are unable to actually put equity into the company. So it has gone through a very long-dated debt instrument which is carrying interest costs, and that is what you are seeing on the books of TSLP. We had to -- we infused the funds actually in the previous quarter, just towards the end of Q4. And that is why you are seeing the P&L impact of the -- in Q1, though the acquisition of Neelachal has happened in -- on the 4th of July. So that is reflecting that. It's a charge actually, not a cash impact. The cash impact is actually much lower because that's the way the instrument is structured, but there will be a P&L impact.
The last chat question: "Congratulations on a good set of numbers. Considering that we are so attractively valued, can you please consider a payout through buyback rather than dividends within the overall payout plan?"
We’ve noted the suggestion. We’ll take it up to our Board at the appropriate time, yes.
We will now move on back to the audio questions. The next audio question is from Sumangal Nevatia of Kotak. So Sumangal, we are unable to hear you. We will now be moving on.
I would now like to hand the conference back to Ms. Samita Shah for closing comments. Over to you, ma'am.
Yes. Thanks, [Kinchuk]. So thank you, everybody, for joining us on the call today. I hope we could answer most of your questions and look forward to connecting with you again next quarter. Take care and goodbye.
Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you very much.