01 — At a Glance
The Government’s Oily Secret: Manganese, Mining & Margin Madness
- 52-Week High / Low₹406 / ₹243
- FY25 Sales (Full Year Basis)₹1,582 Cr
- FY25 PAT (Full Year Basis)₹382 Cr
- Full-Year EPS (FY25)₹18.76
- Q3 FY25 EPS₹2.60
- Book Value₹133
- Price to Book1.86x
- Dividend Yield2.28%
- Debt / Equity0.00x
- Return 3M / 1Y-22.8% / -22.9%
The Confusing Part: MOIL just achieved record production (17.56 lakh MT) and record sales volume (15.88 lakh MT), but posted a 16.9% fall in quarterly profit. Revenue is down by just 1.88%, yet profit tanked 16.9%. Either inflation ate all the margins, or someone in accounting is having a particularly creative day. Welcome to the mining world, where volume growth doesn’t translate to rupee growth. P/E at 17.2x sits above the peer median of 14.9x. Stock down 30% over one year. Math doesn’t math.
02 — Introduction
Mining for Profit (Metaphorically Speaking)
Manganese ore. Not exactly the sexiest commodity on planet Earth. Nobody’s writing Netflix documentaries about it. No influencers unboxing manganese ore hauls. But here’s the thing — every chunk of steel you’ve ever touched, every car you’ve ever driven, every building that won’t fall on your head — they all needed manganese ore to exist. It’s the unsung hero. The invisible backbone. The commodity nobody talks about at dinner parties.
MOIL (Manganese Ore India Limited) is India’s largest manganese ore producer with 53% market share. It’s a government-owned “Miniratna” — which is India’s cute way of saying “small but mighty CPSE.” The company owns 10 mines across Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, a ferro-manganese plant with 12,000 MTPA capacity, and the only Electrolytic Manganese Dioxide (EMD) plant in India. Also, it has renewable energy assets because coal mining guilt is real.
FY24 was historic: record production at 17.56 lakh MT, record sales at 15.36 lakh MT, record turnover of ₹1,449 crore. September 2024 onwards, the concall narrative shifted from “record production” to “pricing pressure” to “margin compression” — which is the mining industry’s way of saying “we’re selling more but earning less.” Q3 FY25 only reinforced this existential crisis.
The stock has been a one-way street downwards for 12 months (-22.9% return over 1 year), despite the company doubling down on exploration, capex, and production targets. Welcome to MOIL — where operational success and stock performance live in parallel universes.
From the Aug 2024 Investor Presentation: “National Steel Policy 2017 targets India’s steel production at 300 MT by 2030. MOIL targets 3.5 million MT of Mn ore by 2030, increasing market share from 20% to 32%.” Translation: MOIL is betting everything on India’s steel ambitions. If India becomes the world’s third-largest steel producer, MOIL wins big. If not, shareholders have a problem.
03 — Business Model: WTF Do They Even Do?
Dig Up Rock. Sell Rock. Count Money. Cry When Price Falls.
MOIL operates in three main segments: (1) Mining Products (95% of revenue) — four grades of manganese ore sold to steel mills, ferroalloy producers, and dry battery makers. (2) Manufactured Products (4% of revenue) — ferromanganese (FM) and electrolytic manganese dioxide (EMD). (3) Power (1% of revenue) — wind mills (20 MW) and solar plants (10.5 MW), partly consumed captively, partly sold to utilities.
The business model is brutally simple: extract ore, grade it, sell it. High-grade ore fetches ₹10,500/MT (FY25 average), medium-grade ₹8,000–9,000/MT, blast furnace grade lower still. Volume has exploded — sales volume grew 27% from FY22 to FY24 — but average realization fell 18% in the same period due to a global glut of manganese. Q3 FY25 realization slightly recovered to ₹10,500/MT, but margins remain under pressure.
The real story is not production. It’s pricing power. MOIL has none. When global manganese prices soften, MOIL’s margin gets squeezed like juice from a lemon. When prices harden, MOIL makes money hand over fist. FY22 to FY24, it was a slow squeeze. In 9M FY25, pricing stabilized but operational costs didn’t. Hence, profit growth = 0.88% over 3 years despite revenue growth of 3.36%.
Market Share53%India Mn Ore
FY25 Prod.~18 Lakh MTBest Ever
FY25 Sales~15.88 LMTYoY +30%
Realization₹10,500Per MT (FY25)
The Elephant in the Room: Global manganese ore prices have fallen from ₹13,000+/MT in FY22 to ₹10,500/MT in FY25. That’s a -20% haircut. You can’t outpace a 20% price decline with 27% volume growth when your operating leverage is thin. MOIL tried. It failed.
💬 If you were a mining company, would you produce more ore when prices fall, or cut production and preserve margins? MOIL chose volume. Comment your take.
04 — Financials Overview
Q3 FY25: The Numbers That Don’t Add Up (In a Bad Way)
Result type: Quarterly Results | Q3 FY25 EPS: ₹2.60 | Annualised EPS (Q3×4): ₹10.40 | Full-year FY25 EPS: ₹18.76
| Metric (₹ Cr) |
Q3 FY25
Dec 2025 |
Q3 FY24
Dec 2024 |
Q2 FY25
Sep 2025 |
YoY % |
QoQ % |
| Revenue | 360 | 367 | 348 | -1.9% | +3.4% |
| Operating Profit | 97 | 95 | 100 | +2.1% | -3.0% |
| OPM % | 27% | 26% | 29% | +100 bps | -200 bps |
| PAT | 53 | 64 | 70 | -16.9% | -24.3% |
| EPS (₹) | 2.60 | 3.13 | 3.46 | -16.9% | -24.9% |
The Head-Scratcher: Q3 FY25 revenue down 1.9% YoY, operating profit up 2.1%, yet PAT down 16.9%? That’s not math. That’s alchemy gone wrong. Operating profit improved because better grades were sold and realization recovered. But depreciation, tax, and “other income” (probably lower interest on cash) made PAT collapse. The effective tax rate in Q3 was 24% vs 28% in Q3 FY24. So the profit was squeezed, not by ops, but by the bottom line. Classic mining quarterly chaos.
05 — Valuation: Fair Value Range
What’s This Government Rock-Seller Actually Worth?
