August 13, 2025

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) has stunned everyone with a dazzling jump in profits this April to June! The company’s net profit for the first quarter of the 2025-26 fiscal year zoomed to ₹6,839.02 crore, more than double last year’s ₹2,841.55 crore, revealed a recent stock exchange filing. This is BPCL’s highest ever Q1 profit, making up more than half of their total ₹13,336.55 crore earned in the entire 2024-25 year. What’s the magic behind this profit boom? BPCL smartly kept retail petrol and diesel prices steady even though the cost of crude oil plunged on the global market. This clever price hold pumped up the company’s marketing margins - the difference between input cost and sale price - leading to better earnings. Despite some headaches, like losses from selling fuel below the purchase price of oil, low refining margins, and ₹2,076.2 crore unpaid LPG subsidy, BPCL still rocked the numbers. The company’s pre-tax profit in the downstream fuel business soared to an eye-popping ₹80,604.7 crore, compared to ₹3,858.9 crore last year. Meanwhile, BPCL earned $4.88 on every barrel of crude oil processed into petrol and diesel during Q1. Though this is down from $7.86 per barrel last year, strong fuel sales kept profits up. The company processed 10.42 million tonnes of crude, up from 10.11 million tonnes earlier, and sold 13.58 million tonnes of petroleum products compared to 13.16 million tonnes a year before. An interesting twist is the unpaid LPG subsidy. BPCL, like other state-run fuel sellers Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), offers cooking gas (LPG) prices below market rates. The government promises to pay them subsidy to cover this gap. However, the ₹2,076.2 crore subsidy for this quarter has not yet been given, despite a government announcement of ₹30,000 crore support for these companies for LPG under-recoveries last fiscal and this year. In short, BPCL’s strategy to keep fuel prices firm amid cheaper crude oil, combined with record sales, has delivered a thrilling profit surge, boosting confidence in this state-run energy giant.

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Tags: Bpcl, Q1 profit, Petrol prices, Lpg subsidy, Refining margins, Oil prices,