Higher tobacco taxes burn cigarette makers' net revenue, volumes, profit in Q1

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

58% : ITC, which controls over three-fourths of the domestic cigarette market, said it had mounted a "strategic and calibrated response by the Cigarettes Business to the unprecedented increase in tax, balancing the interests of all stakeholders".
56% : Earlier in February this year, the government raised the goods and services tax (GST) on cigarettes and tobacco products to a flat 40 per cent.
56% : In the June quarter of FY27, market leader ITC's revenue from the cigarettes business grew 73.71 per cent to Rs 16,596.67 crore, from Rs 9,553.86 crore a year earlier -- a rise which the company attributed to its "staggered pricing approach amidst unprecedented increase in tax".
56% : Godfrey Phillips sells cigarettes under brands, including Cavanders, Four Square, Red & White, Stellar, North Pole and Tipper, besides Marlboro, which is owned by Philip Morris. VST Industries, which owns the Total, Editions and Charms brands, said its quarterly performance was also weighed down by the sharp tax increase.
55% : Its revenue nearly doubled to Rs 881.49 crore in the June quarter, from Rs 424.93 crore a year earlier, but profit after tax fell 24.42 per cent to Rs 42.42 crore, from Rs 56.13 crore in the first quarter of FY26.
53% : Though reported revenues (from operations) of cigarette companies surged as the higher duty component was reflected in sales, their underlying revenues (net revenue) and profits came under pressure as companies grappled with the impact of the unprecedented tax increase.
52% : The government had, with effect from February 1, revamped the taxation structure for tobacco products by imposing an additional excise duty on cigarettes and other tobacco products and a health cess on pan masala, over and above the highest GST slab of 40 per cent.
51% : New Delhi, Aug 2 (PTI) The government's steep increase in taxes on cigarettes and tobacco products has started weighing on the country's leading cigarette makers, with ITC, Godfrey Phillips India, and VST Industries reporting declines in net revenue, volumes and profitability in the April-June quarter, the first full quarter after the revised tax regime came into effect.
50% : It had replaced the earlier tax regime of 28 per cent GST plus compensation cess that had been applicable since the rollout of the GST system in July 2017.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.