Sail's ambitious capacity push faces a risk of oversupply

Tempering expectations

- Ashish Agrawal

Steel Authority of India Ltd (Sail) shares are down 11% over the past year, despite efforts to amplify capacity.

In its FY25 annual report this week, Sail reiterated its production capacity target of 35mtpa (million tonnes per annum) by FY31 from 20mtpa currently. That entails a total investment of ₹1 trillion. Peak spending of ₹10,000-15,000 crore is expected in FY28-FY29. But a risk of domestic oversupply looms, as competitors add capacity.

The start to FY26 was unexciting as Sail trimmed the year's sales volume guidance to 18.5mt (excluding NMDC Steel) from 19.2mt. This is just 3% higher than FY25's 17.9mt.