Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Senco Gold Limited Q4 and FY25 earnings conference call hosted by Antique Stock Broking Limited. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touch-tone phone. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Madhav Agarwal from Antique Stock Broking. Thank you, and over to you, Mr. Madhav.
Yes, hi. Good morning, everyone. I would like to welcome the management and thank them for this opportunity. We have with us today Mr. Suvankar Sen, who is the MD and CEO of the company, and we also have Mr. Sanjay Banka, who is the CFO of the company. I shall now hand over the call to the management team for the opening remarks. Over to you, sir.
Thank you very much, Mr. Madhav, for introducing us. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We would like to welcome all of you for the update call for the performance of Senco Gold Limited for the financial year 2024-2025 and the end of Q4. We are happy to inform you that the Q4 of FY2025 has seen a strong growth in total sales of approximately 21%, where we have seen that in the gold jewelry segment, we have grown by 20% in terms of value. However, because of the increase in gold price, the volume got impacted with a degrowth of 6%. That is in terms of the gold jewelry numbers.
The good part that has been extremely encouraging is the growth that we have seen in diamond jewelry, where we have seen a 38% growth in terms of value for diamond jewelry and a 21% volume growth in diamonds. That has led to an increase in the stud ratio. As we ended the nine months, we were declaring a stud ratio of 10.5%. Thanks to the effort by the team and the continuous new designs and collections that kept getting launched in the month of January and February, we could take our stud ratio to 10.9% as we ended the year. If you look at the overall year of 2024-2025, we have seen a value growth in diamond jewelry of 15% with a marginal growth of 2% in terms of volume for diamonds.
For the whole year, the gold jewelry has seen a value growth of approximately 20% with an impact of volume degrowth of 4%. That has been the broad major category-wide sales for the whole year. We all know that the prices of gold have been on an upward trend for the whole financial year. While there have been challenges in terms of the volume getting impacted, we have seen that the consumers were looking for jewelry within their budget, within the weight range. The weight ranges have been under pressure because prices went up upwards of 30%. There has also been a shift from, along with the 22-carat gold jewelry, a tendency of the consumers to buy more 14-carat diamond jewelry or 18-carat diamond or plain gold jewelry.
There is this gradual shift of priority getting lower to fit it within the budget of the consumers happening. It is especially with the modern Western designs that we are seeing such a shift happening. Now, coming to the profitability, the adjusted tax for the standalone numbers has been INR 207 crore, adjusting to a PBT impact of INR 57.4 crore due to the customs duty that we have seen, the impact that had happened in the month of August. Adjusting to that, we have got an adjusted tax of INR 207 crore. If you look at the unadjusted numbers, it is INR 165 crore.
Something that we are grateful to the team for is the effort and the result, that has been a strong jump of INR 62 crore for Q4 from the INR 103 crore of tax that we had seen for the nine months, 31 December 2024. In terms of opening of new stores, net-net, we have seen 16 stores getting opened for the full financial year. We have opened six franchisee stores, nine Senco company-owned company-operated stores, and one Senet store, which is the lab-grown diamond perfume leather bag. Basically focusing on lab-grown diamond, one Senet store. That has been the 16 stores that we have opened in the full financial year. Another encouraging number for us to see is that the non-east business has grown by 23% to approximately INR 1,230 crore. That has been the increase of the non-east business.
In terms of number of footfalls, while we have seen that the gold prices have been on an upward trend, people are looking for lighter-weight jewelry. The weight ranges are going down. Weddings have been a segment that has driven the business in a major part of the year as well. In terms of measuring of the customer footfall, we have seen that with the LTL and the new stores that have happened, we have got a 17% increase in the number of footfalls overall and a 5% increase in the new invoices. The new customers that got added have been upward of 250,000. To be more exact, it is around 253,000 new customers. The ATV that we have seen, which was INR 63,700 in the previous financial year, has gone up to around INR 73,000. There has been around a 15% increase in ATV.
Here you can see that the increase of ATV has been 15%, but the gold price has moved up above. That is where we are seeing the lighter-weight jewelry happening. In terms of the gold rate, we have seen that when we began the year, the gold rate was about INR 6,300, and as we ended the year, it was around INR 9,000. That is the overall gold rate that we have seen from the beginning to the end of the year. In terms of new designs that got added in gold jewelry, we've always been continuously trying to launch new designs. We've added more than 25,000 designs in gold jewelry and more than 4,000-5,000 designs in diamond jewelry. Another very interesting aspect, the numbers that we need to look at, is the old gold exchange.
Because the prices were on an upward trend, people were feeling the pinch of having a little lower, I would say, budget, and they would exchange their old gold. We have seen that the old gold exchanges went up to close to 39%-40%. That has been a substantial jump. If I recall, maybe two to three years back, the old gold exchange was only 25% of the overall sales, and that has become around close to 40% of the overall sales. That also has helped, I would say, the business to continue to grow and keep getting the customers coming back to the stores.
If you look at the more initiatives that we have taken in Q4 and what has been the reason for the growth and the numbers in Q4, I would say that the wedding sales, because we were in the month of January, February, until mid of March, and even the early weddings of April, May, I think consumers were utilizing these months to buy their wedding jewelry for the season. Also, we had the Valentine's Day and the birthdays and anniversaries of many, many people. I think the love season, as we call it, has led to an increase in the sales of diamonds. Even in the month of March, it was Women's Day, and it gave us an opportunity to connect to our women customers. We launched multiple collections throughout the quarter.
To name a few, the Very Berry collection, which had the designer kind of jewelry with colored stones and diamonds. We have got the kind of fancy-shaped solitaires, the Ice Cube collection. We had the lightweight jewelry, Facets of Love, the Ombre, the Rose, and various new designs in the solitaire segment. I also must say that the contribution of the solitaire diamonds, because what we have seen is that the last financial year, though, 90% above is small diamonds that we sell. For the 10% of the solitaire segment, we have seen a growth in the sales of solitaires, which is above 20 cents, of about 26%. The fact that the prices of solitaires have come down, but consumers thought it as an opportunity to buy.
We are also seeing an upward trend in the price of diamonds now that the war is about to be over. I think consumers are feeling the keen interest to buy solitaires. As we are towards the end of May and we look at the numbers as what has happened in the last two months of this particular new financial year, we are seeing around an 18%-19% growth in terms of value. I think even though the gold prices are close to their all-time high, the faith and the trust of consumers towards the commodity gold and silver has been strong. Consumers are looking for an opportunity whenever they have the ability to buy, or the prices are something within their range, they are wanting to and planning to buy the jewelry. Along with that, the encouraging aspect is the interest on diamonds.
The diamond prices are gradually starting to rise, and even our sales for the diamond jewelry segment, like the way we have seen in Q4, has continued to perform in that manner. Our aim for the whole financial year, again, to reiterate, as we are having the call and we have crossed two months of the year, will continue to be having a top-line growth of 18%-20%. We will try to endeavor to increase our bottom line as well with the focus on improving the diamond sales. In the last financial year, we have seen that during the first half of the year, the interest on buying diamonds was lesser. As the year was ending, the interest went up. Our focus and endeavor to improve the diamond sales will continue to remain.
With the high gold price, we will try to bring in more efficiency in the business in terms of analyzing the data, what kind of products are selling in which stores, what price range. In this high gold scenario, we'll try to optimize our stock and ensure that the top-performing designs and the categories are continuously supplied for higher sales. In terms of the endeavor towards profitability, I think we will be working towards having and achieving an EBITDA of anywhere between 6.8%-7.2%. Our endeavor to achieve a PAT of 3.5%-3.7% shall continue to remain. I think in this dynamic market scenario, a very, very important thing is to focus on lightweight jewelry and to ensure that our new generation customers continue to engage with us and connect with us.
As far as the wedding segment is concerned, which will remain about 35%-40% of the overall business, the handcrafted jewelry, that is the need of the consumers for the wedding segment within their budgets, will be a focus area for us as well. As far as the franchisees are concerned, we intend to add a minimum of 18-20 stores with a higher focus on having more and more franchisees. Minimum 10 franchisees we will be adding and about 8-10 company-owned company-operated stores with a strong focus, as always we've been mentioning, on East India and North India. With this, I would like to end my update for this particular Q4 of the financial year 2024-2025.
At the end of it, I would like to thank all of you for your continuous support, encouragement, faith, and guidance in terms of how do we ensure that in these volatile market scenarios and the geopolitical uncertainties that we see in the world, we will continue to connect with our consumers and acquire more new and new customers. Thank you very much. I will request Mr. Banka, our CFO, to kindly say a few words.
Thank you very much, sir. I would like to add one more context. We have reported the standalone and console both number. Our financials include the results of Senco Gold Limited, Senco Gold Artisan Private Limited, Senco Gold Jewelry Trading Limited, the Dubai entity, and Senet Special Limited. We are commencing the new Senet business in Senet Special Limited, where the results are not, they are just building up. While the standalone top line is INR 6,258 crores, and the standalone adjusted PAT is INR 207 crores, in the console financial, the revenue has increased to INR 6,328 crores, and the adjusted PAT is INR 201 crores. The INR 201 crores is the impact of the three subsidiaries. This is message number one. Now, if you look at the adjusted EBITDA at the standalone number, the adjusted EBITDA has improved from INR 381 crores to INR 427 crores.
A 19.7% top-line growth, a 12.2% growth in adjusted EBITDA. Similarly, the EBIT has remained range-bound from INR 365 crore to INR 369 crore. Finance costs have marginally increased as the borrowings have increased, and we'll discuss in detail. The adjusted EBITDA has improved significantly from INR 188 crore to INR 207 crore. A 10.1% growth in adjusted EBITDA, which is 3.3% adjusted PAT margin. We have given the outlook for the future EBITDA margin with our MD said between 6.8%-7.5%, which is in line with our early predictions, and an adjusted PAT of 3.5%. During the year, we have given you a rate of 16 stores. Now, revenue is INR 1,150 crore, which is around 18% of the total revenue. Stud ratio has been range-bound, and it has grown very significantly in quarter four.
We are hopeful and confident that with the growing interest, the stud ratio, which we have been looking for in the 15% range in three to four years, will achieve that. The rate of interest is a very important factor. You are aware that the gold metal loan, there was some scarcity in February and March. The gold metal loan rate had increased from around 3.6% to 6.6%. The blended rate has increased from 5.9% to around 7% in January and in February and March. However, we are confident that the way it is setting up, there will not be any significant impact of the gold metal loan price.
If we look at the balance sheet, the balance sheet size has increased from INR 3,715 crores to INR 4,733 crores, a INR 1,000 crores increase in the balance sheet level, which is primarily on account of increase in inventory. Inventory has increased by INR 819 crores. Primarily, it is an increase in inventory and increase in bank FD and margin. The bank FD and margin increases due to higher borrowing and higher hedging ratio, etc., which has been funded by net worth. The QIP funds, which we raised, the QIP funds have been used for working capital purposes. A part of QIP funds are still in FD, which we will use in the course of time. Gold metal loan has increased by INR 272 crores.
A very important point we want to raise is that our gold metal loan, which was earlier appearing in the financing activity in line with the industry patterns and discussion with the statutory auditor, we have reclassified it as a part of operating cash flow, which is visible in the face of the balance sheet. The operating cash flow has also improved. During the year, there is an increase in inventory. Still, the operating cash flow is good. The inventory quantity has also increased overall, which we'll discuss in detail. The financial ratios, which you see in the presentation, particularly the return on equity and ROCE, optically, these will look to have a downward trend. What we want to explain is that these are the cost of investment.
Whenever you grow, the ROE and the equity will not yield you the 20% or 21% return in the same year. We look at our return ratio in a long-term fashion. We are a growing company, while my existing portfolio will give me 20% blended return, but the new portfolio will give me higher return. With that, I close my discussion. If MD Sir has to add something kindly add, or we can proceed for any Q&A session now.
Right. No, just to add to what Mr. Banka said, our same store sales growth has continued to be in the range of 15%-16%. That has been a very strong number.
Even though the stores have been existing for a long period of time, whether it is our old customers who are coming and buying their products or new customers that are getting aligned to the brand and getting engaged with the brand, we continue to grow for our same store sales growth at 15%. Also, as I mentioned to you, the old gold exchanges have gone up to 40% of the overall sales. Out of the old gold that comes into our system, and I have been saying it before as well, more than 60% of the old gold is the non-Senco Gold gold that is coming to us, which is, again, I would say, reinstating and reimposing the fact that the shift from the unorganized segment to the organized brand continues to remain in this scenario as well.
Consumers are preferring to buy from brands and organized sellers. With this, I think we are opening up the discussion for the Q&A. Feel free to ask questions. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touchstone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Videesha Sheth from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Yes, hi. Good morning. My first question was, I mean, I do understand that margins need to be looked at from an annual basis and a way to ignore the quarterly wage reads. Just to understand the cost a little bit better, what led to the 25% or 27% increase in the employee spend? On the other hand, you've seen 13% decline in the other operating expenses for the quarter?
Vidisha, as you said that our turnover, which was around INR 1,362 crore, is one of the highest in the last three years. Last year, it was INR 1,130 crore, and previously, it was INR 830 crore.
Q4 turnover.
Q4 turnover. So you are comparing this number against Q3 or Q4? That is the first question.
Oh, sorry. I meant on YOY.
On YOY.
YOY.
YOY. Correct, correct. YOY itself, the top line has grown by almost 20%, right? What we see is that it is never exactly symmetrical because a lot of stores come up at a different point of time. Maybe when you are looking at quarter four number last year, and then the cost base has increased. When the cost base increases to, let's say, by 16 stores, which also have come during quarter one, two, and three, the cost base is not the same. The previous year also, if the store is opened in, even in Q4, in February or March, this year, the impact will be for the full three months. There is an increment because we are investing substantially in our people, in our training.
In order to promote, as the market is competitive, we have to keep our employees motivated with incentive and reward. This is the impact of the overall scheme which we see in the finances.
Got it. So just to clarify, would there be any hedging-related expenses on the OpEx side that's been accounted for?
No, no, no. See, hedging-related expenses, we have explained in detail. Kindly refer to my document. Hedging expenses, depending upon whether it's a fair value hedge or a cash flow hedge, it will either get adjusted to cost of goods sold or will be separately disclosed in financial tax, other income, or other expenses. If there is no other income or other expenses, they will never be clubbed under the general OpEx. Kindly refer to my detailed document on hedging. Yeah. Thank you.
Sure. Moving to the second question, what led to the increase in inventory days from, I think, around 117 in FY 2024 to 119 in FY 2025? How should one look at it going forward?
Inventory days, see, we have said earlier that we are a growing company. The number of stores is increasing. Particularly, if you look at competitor, I understand the inventory days are in the range of 170-180. This is still 166, right? It has increased from 151. As we are looking forward to increase the diamond sales, the diamond inventory days increases. As you go hyperlocal, right, with a higher spread outside is 20%, there are experiments which you have to do with the hyperlocal continuously suffer. These are the regular processes. These are, to my understanding, within the industry norm and slightly better than the top players in the industry.
Also, Vidisha, because of the increase in gold price, we have seen that the sales have also been seasonal. For example, if I consider the whole year, your April, just to summarize, if we see what has happened throughout the year, in the month of April and May, it was the election season. We had seen that the overall sales, even though we had grown, it was against various challenges in the external markets. When we looked at June, July, prices had gone up. In August, the duty got cut, and there was a bumper sale in the month of August. We were running short of inventory because there was, I would say, unexpected sales. In September, before the festive season, prices shot up, and there was a little bit of slowdown.
In October, for Diwali and Dhanteras, we had seen very good sales happening. November and December were wedding. Again, January, February, March, the wedding sales continued to happen. The diamond sales picked up from the month of October, November up to, say, March. The whole year has seen a lot of ups and downs in terms of the growth in sales or the slowdown. With the increase of 30%-40% in gold price, we can only reduce the inventory at the stores to a certain extent to optimize. We also need to be ready to cater to the consumer demand whenever the sales are in demand. That has been another reason, I would say, that the gold price rise. The perfect planning that we are continuously trying to do is making this number of days what it is.
Mr. Vishal can add. As you rightly said, gold price sales, which were in the range of INR 7,639-INR 7,675 in Q3, they improved substantially to INR 7,689-INR 9,012. That means INR 7,675 ending increased to INR 9,012. That is one factor. Vidisha, once again, we have to continuously grow. The March number is always higher because this is a readiness for Akshay Tritiya. We have already talked about our Akshay Tritiya sales. The March number and September number will always be higher because September is ahead of Dhanteras. This is an investment in future. We do not look at it as an idle inventory. These are clearly investments in future. When we are looking at our long-term goal, we are very confident that we are managing our inventory very efficiently.
This time, Akshay Tritiya was also in April rather than in May. We had to be ready for our inventory in the month of March itself.
Understood. Just as a small follow-up to this, by when do you think the ROCEs could inch back to 18%-20%? Is it a three-year, four-year, five-year timeline that you have in mind?
See, we are looking at 16%-17% in the three to four years, right? Even during QIP and IPO, we were cognizant that as we raised funds, we raised IPO funds and QIP funds and PE funds. These have got diluted. Yes, our existing portfolio is giving us this return. Three to four years, it will inch back to 17%-18%.
Thank you. Just last one question from my side. Can you just elaborate on what initiatives are being undertaken to improve the organic growth profile in the non-east region of the country? That's all.
Rather than getting too much into the strategy, we will tell you that in terms of brand building, marketing expenditure, connecting with the consumers, creating designs as per the local taste and preferences, I think these are ways in which we are continuously gathering and attracting consumers in the non-east segment. If you look at the numbers overall, we have grown by 23% in the non-east segment also. As the brand is getting stronger and the awareness level of the brand is increasing, the inquiries and the leads for franchisees in the tier two, three, four towns and cities of the non-east segment of India is also increasing. We would like to grow into the smaller towns using our franchisee model as well. I think that at one end, we have the brand building. At one end, we have the product strategy.
If I may say that in terms of the diamonds, in terms of design for diamonds and in terms of trying to be as competitive in the diamond segment, we are trying our level best to remain attractive to the consumer. I think that product strategy, branding, and distribution, these are the broad three methods by which we are penetrating and growing in the non-east segment.
Thank you. That's all from my side.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Vishal Gutka from ASK Investment Managers. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, Suvankar and team. A couple of questions from my side. First, we're interested in gold metal loans. After seeing a spike of around 6%-10%, can you give a flavor of what is happening as of now? What are the rates as of now, ongoing rates?
See, the ongoing rate, Vishal, ongoing rate has reduced from just one minute. The ongoing rate has, it was higher because there was very short supply of gold in the market. It was around 6.6%. From 3.2% in January, it increased to 5.3% in February and 6.6% in March. In April, it had come down by 100 basis points. May, we are still talking. There is a good availability. Then considering this, all the Cold War, which was there, the uncertainty has come down. The blended interest cost is higher, even today at 7% as against 5.9% earlier. We are given to understand from the banks that this will further come down. Max, max, if I hedge out to take a risk for the entire.
Hello?
That will tend to amount to around, let's say, 1% on INR 1,000 crore is INR 10 crore on a base of INR 10 crore on a top line of around INR 7,400-7,500 crore. Not a major issue now at all. Even from the market side.
Do you expect it to settle down to original levels, or it will remain elevated above the original levels?
As I said, it is very difficult to hedge out the risks. I think that it will still be 100 basis points higher than the earlier rate. It may come down. Let's wait and watch. We will give you an update once the quarter ends.
Got it. The second question is on the diamond price in which Suvankar was highlighting. I think national diamond prices started moving up. Broadly, Suvankar, if you can highlight what kind of price increase that you have in the last one year and what is the exit rate as of now? That is because none of the jewelers have highlighted this point that with regards to they are seeing a bit traction in terms of what you call diamond jewelry sales coming back in big fashion.
Oh, I'm no, but I think that in terms of sales of diamond jewelry, what we had seen in the H1 of the year, H2 of the year has been that much more stronger. The volume growth that you have seen happening in Q3 or Q4 and May, there is this traction. Maybe the others will soon update as and when they think it is fit. That shift and that sales that we are seeing is for two reasons. One is that the high gold prices seem to make consumers look at 18-karat and 14-karat jewelry with diamonds as an option to buy. The second is that the sentiment, which I again may be repeating, that, "Oh, diamond prices are not a good investment," and the prices have come down. Those were the sentiments in the first half of the year for 2024.
I think even at the international level, we are seeing a marginal increase in the diamond prices of solitaires. The smaller-sized diamonds were not that much impacted in terms of price fall anyway. I think that there, again, we are looking at the demand happening and coming back. Solitaires have grown in terms of prices, I think, around 4-5% from what it was maybe a month or two months back. That is a good sign. Just the public news about diamonds, we had one on Jubier shutting down their lab-grown diamond company, which are small, small signals that they are also wanting to focus on growing their natural diamond business. This is how I think the market is playing out.
Lab-grown diamonds will remain a segment to look at for the fashion segment, and natural diamonds will be a segment to look at for your special occasions. The small-sized diamonds is something that is selling anyway more in natural diamonds. That in terms of design and how people bring out the concept, it will continue to be something to look at. At such high level of gold price, let me tell you that purity in terms of 14 and 18-carat will only grow, and diamond jewelry should be growing at these high gold prices. That is my take on it.
Got it. Got it. Last question from my side. Suvankar, the growth rate of 18%-20% looks relatively on the conservative side, given that we are seeing a 30% increase in gold price on year-over-year, which is plus 10% store addition we are planning to do for the entire year. Your thoughts on this?
See, I will only last year, if I say that we were INR 5,300-5,400 crores, then we had aimed for 18%-20% growth. Today, we ended the year with close to INR 6,300 crores. That is where we are saying that we will continue to commit in terms of what we feel is possible. We will try to work hard towards achieving the numbers higher to that. As far as the expectations are concerned, the gold prices have moved up. We are also seeing that the volumes are not moving up yet. Unless the gold price is correct and consumers are looking at jewelry, which is of lighter weight and lower purity, that is something that we need to also keep in mind. The new stores will continue to get added.
It will be wonderful that if the growth rate comes more than what we say. But for all of your analysis and numbers, I think 18%-20% is a good number to begin with.
Got it. Got it. Thank you, Suvankar and team. Wishing you all the best for F26.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Devanshu Bansel from Emkay Group. Please go ahead.
Hi, Suvankar. Good morning. Congratulations on a good execution and an encouraging marginal outlook for FY 2026 as well. My question is on the growth capital, right? The balance sheet is a big play due to, obviously, there is a strong spike in gold prices. We are planning to add about 8-10 company-owned stores as well, right? Interestingly, with the QIP, the debt-to-equity ratio has now come down to 0.9x versus 1.1x last year. I just wanted to check, as in from a growth capital perspective, would debt be a more attractive option as of now because our balance sheet sort of allows us the leverage option? What is your sort of thought process on the growth capital side?
Devanshu, from a strategic point of view, obviously, we are aware that opening more and more franchisees is a much more wiser thing to do and the correct thing to do in this kind of a scenario. To give you a kind of a perspective, there are a lot of inquiries that are getting generated in terms of franchisees also. We are analyzing, checking locations, all kinds of analysis to get the right partners and franchisees. From a strategic point of view, it will always be better to open more franchisees than your company-owned company-operated stores in this scenario. That will be our plan. If we need to open 18-20 stores, we will make sure that keeping our policies in place, we will open minimum 10 franchisees.
If that becomes 12, then obviously, we will have lesser number of company-owned company-operated stores, say 5-6. But we need to get the right partners to get that as well. So if I may say 8-10 company-owned company-operated stores and 8-10 franchisees, that number can become 6 and 13 or 14 as well. But the balance sheet threats in terms of taking more and more funds, one thing we feel is that today's day and time, the gold prices have moved up by 30%-40%. So the assets that we are holding in terms of the inventory at the stores, the value of those assets have gone up.
If you look at in terms of quantity of gold that is there at the stores and the stocks that are needed to be there to sell to the consumers, we are not building up higher quantities, but we are rather optimizing in ensuring that that kind of product is kept at the store, which is most sellable. That efficiency and optimization is continuously happening. That worry of a balance sheet building up is not really there. Yes, the sales team are focusing on building up more and more franchisees. We will only inform to all of you on that as and when we are doing it. As we begin the year, we will try to have a conservative approach of 8-10 owned stores and 8-10 franchisees.
That's a fair point. I just wanted to have some basic strategic thought process behind the debt-to-equity comfort levels, right? Currently, obviously, we are at sub-optimal levels versus the industry levels also. As of now, since the cash is limited on the balance sheet, what is the comfortable level of debt-to-equity that the company would be targeting for? Just a thought process.
There also, if you look at the peak debt-to-equity, March 2023, it was 1.7. March 2022 was 1.3. Last year, it fell to 1.4, 1.2. It is about what is right at a particular point of time. This industry is highly cyclical, and the gold price, so the decision has to be taken at a moment of time. The decision has to be taken in the right perspective.
I think if I give you a straight answer, we won't raise any funds by way of equity to meet any demand and pressure for the growth. It will be managed from internal approval and debt-equity ratio. Continuous inventory efficiency improvement is the core mantra. The CRM, hyperlocal inventory efficiency movement, improving inventory turn, they will continue to be our strategic pillar to manage the growth aspiration.
That is clearly all clear, Mr. Bhaldar. Secondly, I wanted to touch upon another aspect around the customer growth, right? We have been expanding stores by almost 9-10%. Even if we see for the complete year, I guess our customer growth or invoice growth has been about 5-6%, right? Suvankar, how do you read this? Is this just because of inflated gold price? The general fear is also that this industry may lose its sheen because customers are not coming. Maybe they may sort of leave for the purchasing the jewelry and all those things. What are the steps that the company is sort of taking to improve the customer-level growth or the invoice-level growth? Obviously, gold price increases, volume decreases. That is understandable. What are the steps that the company will take to improve the invoice growth?
Devanshu, it is how you are looking at it. One is that the number of invoices has grown by 5-6%. If we look at the footfalls of the consumers with the new stores getting added, or even in the same store sales growth that we are seeing around 14%-15% in terms of value, the footfalls have gone up by almost 16%-17%. Therefore, the perspective is that the consumers are becoming diverse. There is one set of consumers who are adding to any of the jewelry companies, which is the wedding customers. They have weddings in their family. That consumer is coming. They are buying for their wedding, or the family is buying jewelry. They are exchanging their old gold and taking a new design. That is the one segment of customers.
The other segment of customers is where they are buying gold or diamonds for their everyday wear basis or their special occasions. That has been the diversity of the customer in terms of what they are coming and buying. Volumes have taken a hit because the gold prices have gone up above 30%-35%. People are looking at the lighter-weight jewelry. If I may say, it does not really change the broad perspective and fundamentals that, "Oh my God, prices have gone up, and we will lose customers." Jewelry is something that will continue to remain a very, very strong, I would say, segment for weddings, for gifting. Devanshu, one more aspect that you are looking at, for us at least, we are also having a lot of other low-ticket size options in terms of silver and fashion jewelry.
That has also been a great opportunity for us to keep on connecting with the customers. If I look at silver as a category, while we have spoken of gold and diamonds, we have seen that the silver utensils and silver items and jewelry have grown by almost 20% and above in terms of volume as well. There has been that as a segment also where consumers are coming and buying in their small-ticket size. We are exploring opportunities of having a shop-in-shop in various departmental stores, keeping our silver jewelry segment there. I do not see it as a worry. We just need to solve the problem of the customer of creating jewelry, which is within their ticket size and budget. Footfalls have been mostly growing. Again, I am telling you that 21% growth in terms of footfalls, even in this challenging time.
Therefore, what is happening is that when the prices suddenly shoot up, we see lesser footfalls at the stores. When the prices correct or there is a special occasion happening, then we see that everyone wants to buy during that period of time. I think that we need not worry on the way that you are looking at. We just need to wait for the right time, be ready for the right moment. I think coming this Q2, in this scenario, we need to expect a very positive monsoon. Once the festive season starts, this time, the Navratra starts in the end of September. Diwali is in the middle of October. Once we are over with, say, July, from August onwards, the festivities will start. We are very positive and optimistic about the festive season.
Understood. Just last small follow-up here. As in, gold prices have sort of moderated a bit. Can you shed some light? As in, if you were so far trending in line with the 18%-20% expectation for FY2026, just small comments.
Yes, yes. Devanshu, I had said it in my speech as well. We are growing at around 18%-19% as we are towards the end of May. This time in April, we had a very good upshift here and New Year's. It has been a very strong number. That is how it is.
Very clear. All the best for the coming years ahead. Thank you so much for taking the time.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, in order to ensure that the management is able to address questions from all participants, please limit your questions to two per participant. The next question is from the line of Bhavya Gandhi from Dalal and Broacha Stock Broking. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Thanks for the opportunity. My first question is regarding the advertisement and marketing spend for the quarter. My question comes from because our revenue grew 21% on a YOY basis for this quarter, but our other expenses have fallen 13%. What has driven lower other expenses? If you can provide some clarity on that front.
Advertisement expenses have fallen, right? Is that what you're saying?
Yeah. I just want to understand whether in the other expenses because advertisement is a major component, right?
Yeah. Bhavya, if you look at our total advertisement expenditure, which was INR 103 crore last year, it had increased to INR 106 crore, right? This is one expenditure of investment where the management had a decision. It is calibrated based upon market demand, right? If we see there is good demand, then there is no need to spend money. Our expenditure is less than 2%. It has increased. Your question is on the quarter versus last year's quarter, right? Last year.
Yeah, yeah.
I'm going to respond to you. Slide number 42, serial number 4, and you are comparing fourth line. So INR 31 crore last year versus INR 17 crore this year, right? So actually, it is not exactly comparable. There are timings of expenditure. If I have already done the brand building in Q3, there is no need to spend exactly in Q4. It is very dynamic expenditure. If I have incurred a good BPL outside Bengal ahead of the entire year, I will not spend in current year. We prefer to look at this expenditure for the whole year. Every expenditure is not seen on a quarter basis. You can look at HR expenditure in the quarter, revenue for the quarter, but not the marketing expenditure.
In Q3, we had the Navratri, the festivities, the wedding. Everything was there in Q3. We wanted to ensure that in Q4, we bring in more efficiency. We could see that there was an automatic fraction from the consumer side in January and February. We were very conscious of bringing efficiency, and we controlled the budget accordingly. That is how we looked at it.
Got it. I also just wanted to understand the unhedged portion, which is there in our books, basically. If you can just provide a scenario in which if the gold price remains stagnated or if they are falling, do we see any inventory loss on our books? I understand majority is hedged, but on the unhedged portion, how much is it at the moment? If you can throw some light on the gold price movement.
Bhavya, we have discussed a lot about our hedging policy strategy. I will request you if you can look at our detailed document. To give you an answer, we have always said we are 80%-100% hedged, right? 60%-80%, right? Sometimes it can cross 80% also. That is at the inventory level. There are two aspects of hedging.
One is on the inventory-level hedging. When we talk about the losses, on the inventory, there will be no loss. It will be unrealized loss, unrealized gain if the position will be squared up in the next quarter. The question is that whatever gold you have sold in the current quarter, assuming a 6 ton of gold sale, assuming a 1,500 kg of gold sold in a quarter, whether you have purchased the same quantity or not. If I sell gold at a higher price and purchase at a lower price, then there will be unusual realized gain, which will go into the gross margin, right? There is no unusual inventory gains or losses or realized gains or losses. Let us look at the hedging as a part of our gross margin, as an integral to our business, and not as a separate activity.
I mean, logically asking, say, for example, if next one or two years, if gold prices remain stagnated or maybe for I understand that you replenish the quantity of gold in terms of kg. That is the right understanding. Is it right? If the gold prices remain, if you can just throw some light on the demand, how does the demand move in a gold price downward scenario? How does it overall, maybe for two years, how do we see the gross margins or EBITDA margin for that intermittent period?
If the gold price falls, there will definitely be immediate demand because customers will come in the flock, right? While those who have purchased will remain in stock. If the gold price remains stagnant, stable prices, then the demand will increase. In stagnant prices, hedging impact will be lesser. It will give you more stable gross margin. In case of stable gold prices, the gross margin will be stable. In case of volatile gold prices, there may be a timing gap in the gross margin despite the rest of the effort, and they can move from one quarter to other. Over a period of three to four quarters, you will see a smooth margin. To answer your question, we look at a stable EBITDA margin of whatever our MD said, 6.8%-7.2%. If I can make it slightly better, 7%-7.5%.
We look at it 7%-7.5% every quarter, but it may not happen. If you look at three to four quarters, it will surely happen, and that is a past trend. The only anomaly which we saw in quarter two and quarter three this year was due to the customs duty impact. That is why you saw a slightly lesser EBITDA margin, which has become stable in the current quarter. There may be a very one-off impact, let's say the diamond sale is lesser, or if there is one season where you have to offer a more discount. That is all. 7%-7.5% EBITDA margin, one can very comfortably build in the model. That is our understanding.
Very well. Thank you so much. I'll get back in detail. Thank you so much.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Satyajit Sen from Value Research. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Am I audible?
Hello.
Yes, Saptadeep Ji, you're audible. Yeah, you're audible, Sir.
Yeah. Hi. Thank you for taking my question. I just had a couple of questions. First of all, what percentage of the inventory do we get from third-party manufacturing?
Third-party, if you look at our presentation, third-party around 20%-21%. If you look at our quarterly presentation, you will find that number. Around 20%-21% is we buy traded jewelry. Balance around 70%-75% is from the carriers. So in-house manufacturing is 4%-5%.
All right. So another simple question is that some of the third-party manufacturers, one of them is listed, is earning around net margins of around 2%-3%, similar to our company. So my simple question is that why don't we do our own manufacturing to add to our own margin?
We are doing our own manufacturing to a certain extent. In order to get the variety of designs, and every manufacturer has their certain strong USPs in terms of designing and style and category of jewelry. For example, speaking with our head office in Calcutta, I have always been saying that we have a big strength in terms of getting access to our karigars. For the industry, I think in the long run, that will give us an edge because most of the karigars working across the country come from the villages and small towns in and around Calcutta. That is a strength in which we are strong in handcrafted jewelry and the access to karigars. Again, in terms of designing machineries, certain new technology, there are other players who have invested in gold.
We need to get that variety and design from them. Parallelly also, as a company, we have our own units and factory also, which is trying its level best to utilize its full capacity and make machine-made and modern jewelry along with the handcrafted jewelry that we are making from the job workers. It is very much in our plan, but it cannot happen overnight. It is going to be a gradual process.
All right. I mean, in future, how much of, I mean, today, 5%. Are we planning to increase it to about 10%, 20% maybe in future?
No, no, I don't think so. We have, see, as the volume increases, it will be a matter of time, but we have said to be 5%, maximum 5%. I am looking at one of the other players. Your question was, why not manufacturing? A B2B business and risk of trade receivable, okay? If you look at one other such player, almost 80% of the network is stuck in trade receivable, 80% of network, okay? That is one. It is a matter of cash flow also. There are other issues. I think everyone has a business strategy. We feel that we are very comfortable. We have run this business. We have competence and expertise in our business. We don't look at here and there. We have huge opportunity in the current business itself. We are looking at a INR 90 billion market.
A B2C market is always better. It is valued more because you have a direct reach to the customer, which is a B2B business where you are dependent upon a retailer. I think that is where the market places more value on any business. It is direct reach and connect to the customer.
I mean, from a supply chain perspective, we are only going to grow in the future. We will need stocks in a timely manner. We will need the hyper-local design as we grow across the country. There are pluses and minuses. We need to balance it. We will need the support of all these fellow vendors who we consider as vendor partners. We will need to grow together. That is how we are looking at it.
All right. Thank you.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Pallavi Deshpande from Sameeksha Capital. Please go ahead.
Yes, Sir. Thank you for taking my question. Can you hear me?
Yeah. Yeah, Pallavi. Hi. Nice to talk to you after a long time.
Right. Yes, Sir. I just wanted to understand the diamond portion of the inventory. Would it be roughly 10%?
It will be around more than 10%. So when we are talking at more than 10%, around 13%-14% would be the diamond percentage of the total inventory.
Right. Sir, this big fall in the diamond prices in the third quarter which we saw, would we have written down the inventory in the third quarter? Was that included in our hedging loss of INR 900,000,000 that you stated in the third quarter?
See, first of all, hedging is done only on gold and not on diamond. There can be the big fall which you are talking that has not happened on the star and melee category which we sell. So almost 85%-90% of our diamond are below 10%-12% sale. There's a price fall has not happened. Price fall has happened in a higher-end, let's say, solitaire. And even if I call at 40 cents and above as a solitaire, in that category, it has happened. We have not taken any hit on the diamond inventory. Rather, last year, we increased our diamond prices. We've already grown almost 39% plus in quarter four. This quarter, we are also growing. There is no question of us taking any hit on diamond price. We have rather built up our diamond inventory during this crisis time.
Our strategy is entirely different. When the market goes a different way, we take a contrarian view to take the leadership position.
Yes, Sir. Sir, my second question was just again related to this hit in the third quarter that we had of exceptional hit. So that was a hedging loss on the gold jewelry, is what you have said, right?
I mean, see, in quarter two and quarter three, we have taken a hit of customs duty. Most of the other players have taken customs duty hit. Those two are good.
That is true. Apart from that.
See, apart from that, I will once again restate the same thing that we do hedging as a part of our business. We will continue to do hedging. Hedging will always have an impact. We do not call hedging impact as a loss. When the gold price rises, there will be, due to price rise, we will have a realization gain. Since we are doing hedging, there will be adverse impact due to the hedging. We do not want to call it loss. It is a part of the price rise gain and the hedging impact. Hence, you have to look at the gross margin and EBITDA from that perspective. Yes, our EBITDA margin has fluctuated earlier, which we have explained in detail. It was disproportionate due to customs duty. It has stabilized.
We are hopeful and confident and will try to give a very stable EBITDA margin to the market. It will all depend upon the extent and momentum of volatility.
Right. Sir, I wanted to know what is the promoter's take from confusion and having calculated that?
The promoter's take has been disclosed in our quarterly presentation. It is 64.32% if I remember the number correctly. Kindly go to our quarterly presentation.
Right. So.
It is 64.33% on slide number 45.
Right. Sir, lastly, the franchisee's stores are selling. The stud ratio is lower there. I wanted to understand what is the outlook on the stud ratio. Also, in tier three and four, you are seeing more growth. Will that not impact the stud ratio negatively?
See, stud ratio, what we inform you, is that 10.9% is a blended of own store and franchisee store and a blend of various zones. In one of the calls earlier, we said that our own store stud ratio is around 14% if I remember correctly, 13.5%-14%. Franchisee gets to 9.0. Obviously, franchisee is working in tier three and tier four. There the diamond demand will be lesser, right? 12.2% is the number if I—12.2% and 8.6% which we have blended. Incidentally, we have opened store in central region. The stud ratio is 17% for a franchisee. Franchisee stud ratio in central region is 17%. That is only a single store, okay? Otherwise, in West Bengal, east and northeast, it is around 8.5%. Our own store, Delhi NCR, is 15.3%. While my national average is 12.2%, Delhi NCR is 15.3%.
My Chandigarh store is very high. Even in Calcutta, some of the store is very high. We clearly look at a very good stud ratio. It can go up to 18% also. While very conservatively, we are saying 15% next three to four years.
The new store openings will be primarily in North or how will it get?
Mainly, primarily, the new stores opening will be a combination of north and east. We will try to, like we said, that 70%-80% of the stores will be north and east of India. The remaining 20% of the stores will be in the west and south of India. That is how we will be focusing on the growth part. Because as one of the strongest players in the eastern part of the country, we will want to penetrate deeper and deeper into the entire two, three, four towns and cities of east. North being our next core focus area, we will continue to, through own store and franchisee, we will penetrate into the northern part of the country. That is how we will.
In FY25.
I am so sorry, Dwipta]. May we request that you rerun the queue for further questions?
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. We take the last question from the line of Deepak Lalwani from Unifi Capital. Please go ahead.
Hello, Sir. Thank you for the opportunity. First question, when in Mellora, we entered the master franchisee agreement. If you can explain how the business model will work, how many online, how many offline stores, how is it online? Secondly, any investment that we need to do on the store, inventory, etc.? Is there a plan to take up shareholding in this company? This is the first question.
I just talked about the agreement. It's a short-term agreement that we have done. Here, as a master franchisee, we are managing the stores. We are the focus, and you have to understand the strategic initiative that we are taking in our effort to connect and target the new generation, Gen Z, millennial customers. That is the strategic focus. Also, through that focus area, we want to increase our diamond jewelry sales and the stud ratio also. As a company, with that broad thought process of acquiring new customers, new generation customers, increasing the diamond jewelry sales, we are taking various efforts and initiatives. This is one such effort and initiative. Through the master franchise agreement, now, this is like one of those types of stores. It is only lightweight, fast-moving, everyday wear jewelry with a higher share of diamond studded jewelry.
Yes, we will be investing and creating and producing more diamond studded jewelry. We will be investing in the diamond studded jewelry. With this high gold price, as I said, we are looking at 14-carat jewelry that is selling more, 18-carat jewelry selling more for office wear, everyday wear. I think that is where we want to explore the opportunities through this strategic tie-up with Mellora. As far as your question on the future is concerned, I think that all I can tell you is that we are doing due diligence. This is just a short understanding that we have done with them. On further due diligence and analysis, we will take a future decision. That is how we would like to look at it.
Okay. Understood. If any further decision is taken on this, what kind of capital investment will it be? Do you think that we will be requiring to invest in deriving the brand? Because this brand has not been in the market for the last two, three years. What kind of investment is done? Any impact on financials that we should expect? Because this is loss-making currently, any impact on Senco consolidated financials that we should expect because of the losses in Mellora in FY 2026?
See, this is a UPSI information. At this juncture, these are strategic numbers. We will not be able to share these numbers. Let the bridge come, then we'll cross it.
Okay. Sure. Sir, just on the gold.
We basically, as and when things and decisions are taken, will keep updating the market. I think this is too early to expect or forecast how anything will happen. Let us wait. Let's assure as and when things happen, we will have a discussion and update you on this thing.
Sure. Understood. Sir, on the balance sheet part, the debt and inventory, I understand that it's seasonal. How much more debt and inventory should we expect and budget for the new stores for the full year?
See, debt, we have a limit of around, let's say, we are looking at around, let's say, around INR 300 crore-INR 400 crore further working capital. Okay? And let's say around whatever PAT number. So debt to equity ratio of 1:1 or 1.2 is very comfortable we are. This is clearly dependent upon the market price movement. When you compare the debt working inventory value, optically, it has increased by INR 821 crore. The gold, a major part of it, almost INR 500 crore out of this is due to rate variance. Out of INR 821 crore, INR 500 crore is only due to rate variance. INR 321 crore is on account of new store and diamond. Very clearly, now, this impact has come on the balance sheet, which lastly has been funded by our QIP funds and borrowing.
If the situation remains as the gold price remains stable, which we expect it to remain in the range of INR 3,300-INR 3,500 for FY2026, I think maximum INR 350 incremental borrowing is what you can look for.
Understood. Sir, last question on the volume growth in diamond that we saw in this quarter. Is it like a one-time phenomena, or are we seeing growth continuing in Q1 as well? Why I'm asking this is because has lab grown given a setback, or has volatility in the prices given a setback? We just wanted to understand the growth outlook in the diamond state.
See, diamond price definitely Q4 was disproportionate because there was no growth in the earlier quarters. Despite this growth, the stud ratio has remained in the range of 10.8%-10.9%, which is similar to last year. While the value growth has happened, the volume growth is only, I think, some 3%-4% overall. Similarly, lab-grown diamond, I think one more large player has talked about entering into lab-grown diamond. Long-term, we feel that lab-grown diamond will create a new set of aspirants who will ultimately convert into a real diamond. Overall, as you said, total 18%-20% growth, obviously 14%-15% SSG. This growth has to be contributed by gold and diamond both. On a safe level, at 20% or maximum 15%-20% diamond growth, we can look at, which will purely be driven by the volume.
Price increase will not happen. So we can look at 15%-20% diamond volume growth.
Understood. Sir, on that number, if you can disclose, what is our Q4 and FY25 gold and diamond volume growth separately for Q4 and FY25?
The Q4 FY2025 volume growth in gold was -6%. The volume growth in diamond was 21%. That is the Q4 numbers.
Just full year number I have, full year number gold volume is around minus 3% overall, which means around 38% price rise, 21% gold value rise, around 3% volume degrowth in the full year, and 2% diamond volume growth. This 2% diamond volume growth is not fully to our expectation. We look at around, as I said, 15%-20% volume growth. Otherwise, the growth has to come by increasing the prices, or the opportunity is not much.
Perfect. Understood, sir. Thank you for answering. All the best.
Thanks. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Pallavi Deshpande from Sameeksha Capital. Please go ahead.
Yes, sir. Thank you for taking another question. Just wanted to continue on that. Where will the new store openings be? No, sorry. Where will the new store openings happen in FY 2025? With Tier 3, or was it more Metro?
The new store happening, ma'am, out of the 16 stores that we opened, 6 were franchisees that happened in the smaller towns because that's where most of our franchisees are opening. One finest store was in the Metro City, finest store. The remaining 8-9 stores that we opened have been in East India, Calcutta, Delhi NCR, so Pune.
Where were also the openings?
Varanasi Vellupur was opened. Yes. Varanasi Vellupur was in the, if you call it a Tier 2 city. But focusing on East and North India.
Would it be more to say that it was more Metro and Tier 1, the own stores?
No, not more Metro and Tier 1. I think that six stores were in Tier 2, 3, 4, six to eight stores, and six to eight stores in Tier 1, Delhi NCR, Calcutta, in and around Calcutta, suburbs. That is how you have to look at it. As a franchisee model that we want to grow, again, the strategy is to focus on the smaller towns. That is the way that we want to penetrate into the market.
This Everlight store will be totally different, right, from these guidance that you have given?
Yes. The Everlight store, Everlight store, like we opened one Everlight store in Rashi as well. Everlight store is a model in which the franchisee or our own, like we opened in the month of April, we opened one Everlight store in Andheri Metro Station, right?
Right.
That is where we are trying to focus on the everyday wear, lightweight jewelry below a ticket size of INR 100,000, but focusing more on the INR 20,000-INR 50,000 price range with a 50%-60% diamond focus. That is how we are looking at the Everlight stores.
So that's not included in the 16 number, right, the store number?
It is in the 16 number, ma'am. In the 16 number, the Everlight store is included.
Okay. So how many Everlight stores were there in FY 2025?
How many Everlight stores were total there in FY25? Bankaji, sorry.
Everlight store is written, so if you go to this just one minute.
Four to five Everlight stores, four to five. But we will let him confirm the number.
Will this number be constant in FY 2026 also?
Everlight store is five number, which we have disclosed outside number sixteen. No, Everlight store will increase. See, it makes sense as you look for lower ticket items. As you want to reach to the youngsters and Gen Zs and millennials, we have to find where they are staying. Are they living in the big housing society, or they are on the sill? That way, focus will also be Everlight. You can look at three, four more Everlight stores out of twenty. Twenty is a conservative number. Everlight, our inventory exposure is lower. If you like, we have opened in Andheri Station, we can open more.
Inventory would be what, five, six stores?
Yes. Yeah.
Yes.
I request you another estimate based on this call. Kindly grace and visit our Andheri Metro, this Everlight stores. You will get a fairly good idea. We have got other stores as well in Andheri, Lokhandwala, etc. That will help you understand a better understanding of our business model.
Right. I saw it on the website. It's a nice collection there. Just wanted to understand what any revenue targets for this for the next two years for Everlight?
Sir, ma'am, we are not having any separate revenue target for Everlight. We are right now putting it within the target. These are the strategies with which we want to increase our diamond stud ratio. We have not specified any particular number yet. Those stores have their own targets. As and when the scaling up of the stores will happen and we get set with the business model further stronger, we will start sharing these separate revenue targets for Everlight.
Right. The pricing, I mean, CaratLane, Bluestone, that would be the Pure set, right?
Yeah. The Pure, that would be the pricing in terms of the overall kind of designs and products that are there. In terms of the further breakup, if we get into it, we will stay more competitive than our competition.
Right. The last question was on the tax rate. Why is it higher?
Just two.
Right. Thank you.
Time constraint. That will be the last question. I'm sorry, ma'am.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to the management for closing comments. Thank you and over to you, sir.
No, we thank you all, and we are very happy and pleased to report our results. As you said, the EBITDA margin is stable. We continue to look at growth. We continue to look at all the KPIs, particularly return on equity and return on capital employed, and our cognizance of our responsibility to give a superior return, which we will continue to work by calibrating the various business levers, financial, operational, customer as well. With that, a lot of thanks from our side, including comments from our MD, right?
Thank you all for joining the call. Once again, to summarize, our Q4 numbers compared to the previous year's Q4 have remained very strong with the revenue up by 21%. The EBITDA went up by more than 44% on previous year's quarter to this year's quarter. We have seen that with the increased diamond stud ratio, our margin for Q4 has also improved from 7.7% to 9.2%. Therefore, I think that the importance in today's real time is to stay and remain focused. We are aware of the various levers that will drive the business growth and the business profitability. We are well conscious of the fact that in this increasing gold price, we need to create designs as per the need and the budget of the consumers, which we are very much doing. Our sales team is engaging with the consumers.
As we enter this new financial year, we have shared you with our ideas, expectations, plans, and we are confident that we will achieve the numbers in top line and the bottom line with the effort that we are making. Thank you very much and all the best.
Thank you, members of the management. On behalf of Antique Stock Broking Limited, that concludes this conference. We thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.