Sudhir Vasudeva in New Delhi on Tuesday. A Telegraph picture

New Delhi, May 29: Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd has posted a 102 per cent jump in net profit at Rs 5,644 crore during the fourth quarter ended March, helped by a spike in crude prices and a weak rupee.

Net profit stood at Rs 2,791 crore in the same period a year ago.

During the last fiscal, the upstream oil firm shelled out Rs 14,170 crore to subsidise diesel, domestic LPG and kerosene against Rs 12,136 crore in the year-ago period, chairman and managing director Sudhir Vasudeva said.

The rupee depreciation — from 47.95 against the dollar in the fourth quarter of 2010-11 to 50.29 in the quarter ended March 2012 — helped to offset the rise in the fuel subsidy outgo.

“Every rupee depreciation against the dollar increases our topline by about Rs 1,600 crore,” director (finance) A.K. Banerjee said.

ONGC gets paid in dollar for the crude oil and natural gas produced by it.

Profits would have been higher by over Rs 8,000 crore without the subsidy outgo, Banerjee said.

Vasudeva said ONGC got $44.32 on the sale of every barrel of crude after giving a record subsidy discount of $77.3 per barrel. “Our cost of production after the recent increase in oil cess to Rs 4,500 per tonne is $44 per barrel.”

HPCL show

Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd has posted a 312 per cent growth in net profit at Rs 4,631 crore during the last quarter of 2011-12 against Rs Rs 1,123 crore in the year-ago period .

Chairman S. Roy Choudhury attributed the rise in profits to “higher subsidy compensation for under-recoveries”. However, net profit for the full year fell to Rs 911 crore from Rs 1,123 crore in the previous year.

He said retailers could cut petrol prices by about Rs 2 per litre from next month if global oil prices and the rupee stabilised at current levels.