ASK Automotive Ltd

Price story Before the numbers, the tape. A stock price moves through four repeating seasons: a flat base (stage 1), an advance (2), a top (3), a decline (4). Where the price sits in that cycle frames everything below.

ASK Automotive Ltd trades at ₹528, building a base and 7 weeks into that stage. That is +15.2% against its own 200-day average. It sits at 84% of a 52-week range of ₹392 to ₹555. On relative strength it has been ahead of the NIFTY 500 on a trailing-13-week view for 3 straight weeks.

Today the stock is building a base — week 7 of stage 1. At ₹528 it trades +15.2% versus its 200-day average and sits at 84% of its 52-week range (₹392–₹555).

Against the market, two honest reads. Cumulative: over the last 2.7 years the stock moved +70% while the NIFTY 500 moved +33% — ahead of the index over the full window. Recent form: on a trailing-13-week view the stock has been ahead for 3 straight weeks — the ribbon below is that same metric, week by week.

What would end the trend, mechanically: two Friday closes in a row below the 200-day line. That is the exit rule — no debates.

Valuation P/E is the price of ₹1 of annual profit: how many rupees the market pays for each rupee the company earns in a year.

ASK Automotive Ltd trades at 35.2× P/E, mid-range by its own standards (37th percentile). Its long-run median P/E is 37.2×, measured across 2.7 years of weekly readings. This places the multiple against the stock’s own record, and says nothing about what the business is worth.

Today's P/E of 35.2× is mid-range by its own standards (37th percentile), against a long-run median of 37.2× measured over 2.7 years of weekly readings. This is a comparison against the stock's own history — not a claim about what it is worth.

One caveat before moving on: margins are the best this company has ever printed — cheap against its own history on record margins is not the same thing as cheap. If profitability mean-reverts, today's multiple is higher than it looks.

Why the multiple sits where it does: over the past year annual EPS moved +20.1% against a +11.6% price move — earnings outran the price, pushing the multiple DOWN its own range.

Put together: the multiple is unremarkable against its own past, so the story rests on the earnings line underneath it, not the multiple.

Stage: Mixed Every business sits somewhere on a fundamental arc, and this page names the spot before anything else. The last twelve quarters of revenue, profit and EPS growth — plus the return the business earns on its capital — are read as curves: Deteriorating (the curves are falling), Turning around (a trough has just formed and the last few quarters lift off it), Improving (the climb off the trough is sustained), Consistent (steadily positive with healthy returns), Topping out (still high but decelerating from the peak). When the curves genuinely disagree the read is Mixed; too little history is No read. CAGR (compound annual growth rate) is the smooth yearly pace that turns the starting value into the latest one — the fairest way to compare growth across different time spans. Read the columns together: if the 1-year number towers over the 10-year, recent growth is running hotter than the long-run trend. A dash means that window is not held, or the base year was a loss (where a growth rate is not meaningful).

ASK Automotive Ltd reads as mixed on its fundamental arc. Mixed — growth is normalizing off a hyper-growth base: profit growth has eased from +59.7% at its peak to +20.2% but is still expanding, ROCE holding at 26.8%. The read is built from 12 quarters across 4 curves, on full evidence.

Why it matters: when the curves disagree, the per-curve reads above matter more than any single verdict.

4-Factor Sector Score

61.5/100 — rank 3 of 4 in Auto Ancillaries - 2 Wheelers · 87% evidence confidence

ASK Automotive Ltd scores 61.5 out of 100 against the 4 companies it is compared with in Auto Ancillaries - 2 Wheelers, ranking 3. Balanced evidence: keep at normal research priority and require another comparable period before raising conviction.

The four contributions add to the total exactly: 19.7 + 20.9 + 12.9 + 8 = 61.5. This is the SAME number shown on the sector comparison — it is computed once, for the whole peer set, and read here.

What would change it: The read weakens if profit growth turns negative or margin improvement reverses while sector-relative strength deteriorates.

Revenue Revenue is the top line: everything the company billed its customers in the period.

ASK Automotive Ltd reported ₹1,147 Cr of revenue in the Mar 26 quarter, +34.9% year on year. That is the 12th straight quarter of year-on-year growth. Over 7 years it has compounded at 12.9% a year. The last full year, FY26, came in at ₹4,176 Cr. The last four reported quarters add to ₹4,176 Cr.

FY26 revenue came in at ₹4,176 Cr (+16.0% on the year), capping 7 years at 12.9% compound. The latest quarter (Mar 26) printed ₹1,147 Cr, +34.9% year on year — the 12th consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth.

Pace check: the last four quarters averaged +16.3% growth against the decade's 12.9% — the current year is running faster than its own long-run rate.

Acceleration check: trailing-twelve-month revenue grew +16.0% over the last 4 quarters against +18.1%/yr over the last 8 — stabilising; TTM profit +20.2% vs +30.9%/yr — rolling over.

Operating margin Operating margin is what is left of every ₹100 of sales after running the business, before interest and tax. It is the cleanest read on pricing power and cost control.

ASK Automotive Ltd's operating margin is 12.0% in the Mar 26 quarter, +0.0 percentage points against the same quarter a year ago. That is the widest this company has ever printed on a full-year basis. Across 8 fiscal years the operating margin has ranged 8.0% to 13.0%. The current quarter sits inside that band.

The latest quarter's operating margin is 12.0%, +0.0 pp against the same quarter a year ago. Across 8 fiscal years the operating margin has ranged 8.0%–13.0%, and FY26's 13.0% is the top of that band — a record year.

🚨 Why the margin moved: operating margin went −0.7 pp year on year while gross margin went −2.7 pp — the loss came mostly from the gross line: input costs and pricing.

Worth repeating from the valuation section: cheap against its own history on record margins is not the same thing as cheap — a record margin flatters every ratio built on top of it.

Net profit Net profit is what survives every cost, interest and tax — the number EPS, dividends and book value all grow from.

ASK Automotive Ltd earned ₹72.0 Cr of net profit in the Mar 26 quarter, +24.1% year on year. It is the 10th consecutive quarter of growth. Full-year FY26 profit was ₹297 Cr. The 7-year compound rate is 14.7%. That is 6.3% of the quarter's revenue. The same quarter a year earlier earned ₹58.0 Cr.

Mar 26 profit was ₹72.0 Cr, +24.1% year on year — the 10th consecutive quarter of growth. On the full year, FY26 printed ₹297 Cr (+19.8%), and the 7-year compound rate is 14.7%.

Why profit moved: revenue contributed +34.9% and the margin +0.0 pp — the quarter was revenue-led, with the margin roughly flat.

Pace comparison, last four quarters: profit +20.1% vs revenue +16.3%. Profit is growing faster than sales — fixed costs are being spread over a bigger base, and each extra rupee of revenue drops more to the bottom line.

Cash flow — the router The P&L says what was earned; the cash-flow statement says what actually arrived. Operating cash flow (CFO) against profit is the cleanest lie detector in the accounts.

Over the last 3 fiscal years 134% of ASK Automotive Ltd's reported profit arrived as operating cash — the cash follows the profit. In FY26 that was ₹301 Cr of operating cash against ₹297 Cr of profit. After ₹500 Cr of capital spending, ₹−199 Cr was left as free cash.

FY26: operating cash of ₹301 Cr against reported profit of ₹297 Cr, leaving free cash of ₹−199 Cr after ₹500 Cr of capital spending. Across the last 3 fiscal years the conversion rate is 134% of profit.

Cash-flow readings here are annual — that is the resolution our series carries, so this section moves once a year.

Why conversion sits at 134%: the cash cycle held roughly steady between FY21 and FY26 — so conversion tracks profitability rather than the cycle.

Router verdict: the bigger cash user is investment — capital spending ran 4.2× depreciation over three years, so the next section's job is to check what that build-out is buying.

Where the cash goes Working capital is the cash tied up between paying suppliers and getting paid: debtor days (customers owe), inventory days (stock waits), and the cash conversion cycle (the whole loop, in days of sales).

ASK Automotive Ltd's cash conversion cycle runs 18 days in FY26, down from 18 days in FY21. Capital spending ran ₹1,146 Cr over the last 3 years. At FY26 sales of ₹4,176 Cr each day of that cycle holds about ₹11.4 Cr, so roughly ₹206 Cr sits inside the business at any moment.

FY26: debtors at 26 days, inventory at 41 days — roughly 1.3 months of stock waiting to sell; that is where the cash sits while it waits — for a full cycle of 18 days, tighter than FY21's 18.

The full loop: cash goes out to suppliers and production on day 0; stock waits 41 days to sell; customers pay about 26 days after that; and suppliers themselves are paid at 49 days — netting out to the 18-day cycle.

In money terms: at FY26 sales of ₹4,176 Cr, each day of the cycle holds about ₹11.4 Cr — so the 18-day loop keeps roughly ₹206 Cr sitting inside the business at any moment.

On the investment side: capital spending of ₹1,146 Cr over the last 3 fiscal years against ₹272 Cr of depreciation — the company is building well ahead of wear-and-tear. Capital work-in-progress stands at ₹152 Cr (FY26) — capacity paid for but not yet earning.

The synthesis: the cash is going into capacity, not disappearing into the cycle — the question becomes whether the new capacity earns.

Return on capital Return on capital employed (ROCE) is the profit the whole business earns on all the money in it — equity and debt together. It is the single best test of whether growth creates value or just size.

ASK Automotive Ltd earns a ROCE of 25% in FY26. That is up from a trough of 16% in FY22. Return on invested capital clears the cost of that capital by +5.0 percentage points, so growth here adds value rather than only size. The wiring behind it is 7.1% net margin on 1.63× asset turns.

FY26 ROCE is 25%, recovered from a FY22 trough of 16% — the full ladder below shows the fall and the climb, undoctored.

Why the return is what it is — the wiring (FY26): 7.1% net margin × 1.63× asset turns × 1.95× balance-sheet leverage ≈ 22.6% on equity. Margin does its share; leverage is a meaningful part of the equation.

The capstone test — ROIC − WACC: 17.0% − 12.0% = a +5.0 pp spread. The 12.0% is a standing assumption for the cost of capital in India, not a per-stock estimate — read the sign and the size of the spread, not the decimals. Positive but thin — value creation with little room for error.

Debt Debt-to-equity says how much of the business is funded by borrowings. Low is the safe corner; the trend matters as much as the level.

ASK Automotive Ltd carries total debt of ₹679 Cr against shareholder equity of ₹1,311 Cr as of Mar 26, a debt-to-equity of 0.52. On the annual view that ratio went from 0.51 in FY23 to 0.52 in FY26. Read the returns elsewhere on this page with that leverage in mind.

Mar 26: total debt of ₹679 Cr against shareholder equity of ₹1,311 Cr — a debt-to-equity of 0.52. On the annual view, debt-to-equity went from 0.51 (FY23) to 0.52 (FY26). Read the returns on this page with that leverage in mind.

Ownership Who owns the stock, quarter by quarter: promoters (the controlling owners), foreign and domestic institutions, and the public. Steady accumulation by people close to the numbers is a signal; a quiet register is also an answer.

Promoters cut 10.0 points of ASK Automotive Ltd over 8 quarters, the biggest move on the register. That takes promoters to 75.0% of the company. Domestic institutions moved +6.8 points over the same window, to 11.0%. The register is read on the four disclosed classes only; nothing is inferred between filings.

The register over the last two years — Promoters: −10.0 points over 8 quarters to 75.0%; Domestic institutions: +6.8 points over 8 quarters to 11.0%; Foreign institutions: +4.6 points over 8 quarters to 9.5%.

🚨 Why the register moved: promoters drove it (−10.0 points), absorbed on the other side by domestic institutions (+6.8 points) — distribution into the market’s bid.

Safety line The Z-score estimates how far a company sits from balance-sheet distress — above roughly 3 is safe, below roughly 1.8 is the danger zone. It was built for manufacturers, so it is not applied to banks and lenders.

ASK Automotive Ltd: the Z-score reads 7.34. A Z-score above roughly 3 reads as safe and below roughly 1.8 as the distress zone, so this sits well clear of distress. It is a distance-to-distress estimate from the balance sheet, not a forecast of failure.

Why it matters: a Z-score of 7.34 sits well clear of the distress zone — the balance sheet is not the risk here.

The safety line in one sentence: the Z-score reads 7.34.

Frequently asked questions