Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) has declared the result for the three month period ended December 2009.

During the third quarter, the company's net profit fell 52.60% to Rs 379 crore as against Rs 799.8 crore during the corresponding period of last year (2008).

The net sales of the company came up to Rs 32,161 crore as against Rs 31,884.5 crore.

The company witnessed a marginal increase of 1.44% in its total income, which stood at Rs 326,484.90 million for the three month period ended December 2009 as against Rs 321,846.30 million for the same quarter of 2008.

The EPS of the company dropped 52.58% to Rs 10.49 for the quarter ended December 2009 as compared to Rs 22.12 in 2008.

The company announced that its gross refining margin for Mumbai was $1.44 per barrel for 9-month period, and third quarter under recoveries stood at Rs 3,990 crore & nine-month at Rs 6308 crore.

BPCL, on Jan 14, said that it will commence fuel supplies from its Bina refinery in Madhya Pradesh by Sept 2010, around 6-months later than thought as state-run BHEL postponed key equipment supply.

Mr. Ashok Sinha, CMD of the company said, "We should be commissioning the refinery by July."

The six million tons a year facility, being constructed by Bharat Oman Refineries a JV of BPCL and Oman Oil Company, is mechanically over but has not yet began commissioning of facilities without a 99-MW captive power plant that was to be set up by BHEL.

Mr. Sinha added that the commissioning will start by April 2010 and the whole refinery would be commissioned by July. Fuel supplies will start from September after BORL stabilizes the division.

Today (Jan 28), the shares of the company closed at Rs 547, down 1.4%, on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). The share price has seen a 52-week high of Rs 658 and a low of Rs 329.15 on BSE.

Current EPS & P/E ratio stood at 123.43 and 4.43 respectively.