Telecom, retail help Reliance offset modest energy gains

ET Intelligence group: Reliance IndustriesNSE 2.80 % Friday extended its record of beating Street estimates of quarterly earnings – on 15 of the last 19 occasions– as telecom and retail businesses helped offset the impact of cyclicality in the core energy vertical at India’s most valuable company.

The first noticeable increase in phone services tariffs in about five years helped Reliance achieve double-digit quarterly earnings growth, which was further undergirded by profitable expansion of the retail footprint that now touches 7,000 towns.

Earnings growth was 5 per cent higher than consensus quarterly EPS estimates, and the average earnings beat in the past 19 quarters is 11.3 per cent, according to Bloomberg.