01 — At a Glance
The Freshly-Listed Green Cement Player Everyone’s Arguing About
- 52-Week High / Low₹162 / ₹107
- Q3 FY26 Revenue₹1,621 Cr
- Q3 FY26 PAT₹130.6 Cr
- Q3 EPS (₹)1.04
- Annualised EPS (Q3×4)₹4.16
- Book Value₹44.4
- Price to Book2.77x
- Dividend Yield0.00%
- Debt / Equity0.75x
- Net Debt/TTM EBITDA2.90x
Auditor’s Take: Fresh IPO listing (Aug 2025). Q3 FY26 hit ₹1,621 crore revenue (+13.2% YoY), PAT of ₹130.6 crore. But here’s the gotcha — the company reported ₹1,466.4 crore in non-cash CCPS fair-value charges ahead of equity conversion. Adjusted PAT is a healthier story. Balance sheet is saddled with ₹3,557 crore net debt post-IPO, mainly from aggressive capex for the North entry (Nagaur, Rajasthan). ROCE is looking weak at 4.64% because the company is mid-expansion. Wait two years.
02 — Introduction
The JSW Group’s Quietly Competent Cement Play
Alright, let’s talk JSW Cement. It’s the cement company you’ve never heard of, but your neighbour’s building is probably using their GGBS. The JSW Group’s cement subsidiary cranks out India’s lowest-carbon cementitious products at 258 kg CO₂ per tonne — 52% lower than the Indian peer average. That’s not marketing. That’s actually true. And yet the stock is trading at a P/E of 51.7x, which is absolutely insane for a cyclical cement company.
The company went public in August 2025 at ₹1,600 crore in fresh equity. They’ve got 21.6 MTPA grinding capacity today, sitting as the #3 fastest-growing cement manufacturer in India. They control 84% of India’s GGBS market — not market share in some niche. They have GGBS domination. Meanwhile, Crisil just upgraded them from A+ to AA- in October 2025. The credit narrative is improving. The equity narrative is… well, it’s trading at 51.7x P/E, so pick your interpretation.
In Q3 FY26, they delivered 3.56 million tonnes of total volume (cement + GGBS), up 14% YoY. EBITDA per tonne jumped to ₹802, up 15.6% versus Q3 FY25. They’re building like a startup on RedBull — integrating a 3.3 MTPA clinker unit in Rajasthan, launching a UAE grinding facility, and eyeing the data centre cooling fluid business (eventual play, “4-5 years away”).
But here’s the elephant: the balance sheet is levered at 2.90x net debt/TTM EBITDA. They’re capex-heavy. The ROCE of 4.64% is abysmal — mostly because they just spent ₹6,500 crore and are still ramping. They don’t pay dividends. And cement is a commodity. Welcome to the party.
Concall Highlight (Feb 2026): “GGBS demand to outgrow cement CAGR at 9–10% versus cement 7.5–8.5% through FY30.” Management is explicitly calling out slag as the structural growth driver. Translation: they’re betting RMC adoption in India will explode, pulling blended cement and GGBS. Bold. Possibly correct.
03 — Business Model: Slag > Clinker
They’re Not Making Cement. They’re Assembling Slag.
JSW Cement’s business model is structurally different from UltraTech, Ambuja, or Grasim. While traditional cement makers grind clinker at 80–90% of the blend, JSW does this: they grab Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag (GGBS) from their adjacent JSW Steel plant, add just enough clinker for strength, and sell blended cement or pure GGBS.
The clinker factor in Q3 FY26? Just 52%. Blended cement ratio? 63%. That’s not a typo. The company is deliberately making lower-clinker, slag-heavy products. Why? Because slag is cheaper, carries an environmental halo, and JSW Steel’s blast furnace is sitting right next to the grinding plants. It’s vertical integration on steroids.
Product split (9M FY26): Cement 54%, GGBS 42%, Clinker 4%. Note the mix — 42% of revenue from pure GGBS sales, where they’re a monopolist at 84% market share. Price realization on GGBS? ₹3,655/MT in Q3, locked in by multi-year contracts with RMC suppliers. Cement realizations declined 3.9% QoQ to ₹4,459/MT due to market softness, but GGBS held flat. That’s the flywheel — one product hedges the other.
Distribution footprint is growing: 4,653 dealers as of Mar 2025, with 40,000+ rural touchpoints. They’re selling to RMC companies (now ~40% of volumes), infrastructure (roads, metros, airports), and retail construction. The go-to-market is “customer education on blended cement benefits” plus “sell more GGBS to architects and structural engineers.” Nerdy. Effective.
04 — Financials Overview
Q3 FY26: The Quarterly Breakdown
Result type: Quarterly Results | Q3 FY26 EPS: ₹1.04 | Annualised EPS (Q3×4): ₹4.16
| Metric (₹ Cr) |
Q3 FY26
Dec 2025 |
Q3 FY25
Dec 2024 |
Q2 FY26
Sep 2025 |
YoY % |
QoQ % |
| Revenue | 1,621 | 1,433 | 1,436 | +13.2% | +12.9% |
| Operating Profit | 285 | 217 | 268 | +31.5% | +6.3% |
| OPM % | 17.6% | 15.1% | 18.6% | +250 bps | -100 bps |
| PAT | 130.6 | 47.5 | 75.4 | +175% | +73.2% |
| EPS (₹) | 1.04 | 0.49 | 0.63 | +112% | +65.1% |
The Accounting Mess: Q3 and 9M reported PAT look inflated from Q3 FY25 because Q3 FY25 had a trough. The real story is the operating leverage. EBITDA/ton climbed to ₹802 in Q3 FY26 from ₹694 in Q3 FY25 (+15.6% YoY), even as cement prices fell QoQ. Volume growth of 14% YoY and 14.3% QoQ is where the magic is. The 9M FY26 adjusted PAT (after backing out the ₹1,466.4 crore CCPS fair-value expense) is ₹306 crore. Full-year FY26 guidance is approximately ₹350–400 crore adjusted PAT if cement prices stay moderate.
05 — Valuation: The Uncomfortable Question
Why Is This Trading at 51.7x P/E?
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