Private firms’ sales growth slows in FY25 as costs rise, RBI data shows

Net sales of non-financial private companies increased at a slower pace of 11.4% in 2024-25 as compared to 11.7% in the previous year, according to Reserve Bank data released on Monday.

The RBI released data relating to financial performance of non-government non-financial (NGNF) private limited companies during 2024-25 based on audited annual accounts of select 15,919 companies reported in the Indian Accounting Standards (Ind-AS) format.

Services sector recorded 13.5% growth in net sales during 2024-25, driven by ‘Trade – wholesale & retail’, ‘Real Estate’ and ‘Transport and Storage services’ sub-sectors.

Sales growth in the manufacturing sector moderated marginally to 9.2% in 2024-25 from 9.4% in the previous year.

Total paid-up capital (PUC) of these companies amounted to ₹8,44,198 crore as at end-March 2025, which covered 40.3% of the total PUC of NGNF private limited companies.

At the aggregate level, operating expenses increased relatively at higher rate in 2024-25 as compared to the previous year, driven by manufacturing expenses and remuneration to employees, the RBI said.

“Remuneration to employees increased for services sector while it moderated for the manufacturing sector,” it said.

Further, operating profit and profit after tax continued to show double-digit growth in 2024-25 on top of high growth in 2023-24.

Gross capital formation (which includes fixed assets and inventories) accounted for 48.2% of total fund usage, up from 45.3% in the previous year.

(Except for the headline, Fortune India has not edited the content of this PTI report.)