Adani Ports hikes cargo volume guidance for FY24

Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd (APSEZ) on Tuesday said it is targeting over 400 million metric tons (MMT) of cargo volumes in FY24, surpassing the upper end of the guidance range (370-390 MMT) provided at the start of the current financial year.

India's largest private ports operator handled 35.65 MMT of cargo volumes in December 2023, resulting in a 42% year-on-year (YoY) increase. Dry bulk cargo handling was up 63% while handling of containers increased by over 28% on a yearly basis.

Reacting to the development, shares of Adani Ports and Special Economic Zones (APSEZ) rose 3% today to close at ₹1,079 apiece on the National Stock Exchange (NSE). The market cap of the Adani Group company rose to ₹2.33 lakh crore.

The Adani Ports stock has gained 23% over the past month and 31.5% over the last one year.

For the quarter ended December, APSEZ handled around 109 MMT of overall cargo, with around 106 MMT contributed by our domestic ports portfolio. In the initial nine months of FY 24, APSEZ managed around 311 MMT of total cargo, recording 23% growth.

"APSEZ crossed the 300 MMT cargo mark in just 266 days versus its previous best of 329 days in the previous financial year. This milestone only proves that our strategy of driving operational efficiencies to achieve industry leading growth is yielding the desired results. We are now targeting over 400 MMT of cargo volumes in FY24, surpassing the upper end of the guidance range (370-390 MMT) provided at the start of the current financial year," says Karan Adani, CEO and whole-time director, APSEZ.

During the April-December period, many APSEZ ports recorded new milestones. Mundra, the flagship port, handled around 5.5 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent) in a record nine months and is on track to surpass 7 million TEUs of container cargo volumes during FY24. It handled 3,000 ships in just 261 days, surpassing its previous record of 288 days in FY23.

In October 2023, the port handled 16 MMT of cargo volumes and established a new milestone of achieving the highest cargo volumes by any Indian port in a single month.

Other ports, both on the east and west coastline, recorded key milestones during 9M FY24. The second largest port in the APSEZ portfolio, Krishnapatnam, berthed its largest-ever vessel.

In November, the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), the U.S. government's development finance institution, committed to lend $553 million (about ₹4,600 crore) to Adani Ports for the Sri Lanka port project. Adani Port is building a deep-water container terminal at Colombo Port, which is the largest and busiest transshipment port in the Indian Ocean. Adani Group also holds about 70% stake in Israel's Haifa port.