Indian Oil Corporation may see elevated profit levels for the March quarter despite a possible inventory loss.

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A CNBC-TV18 poll expects revenue of India's largest refiner to decline quarter-on-quarter, while other parameters may see an improvement.

Analysts are expecting Indian Oil's refinery throughput to grow by 3 percent from the December quarter to 18.7 MMT, led by a ramp-up in utilisation levels at its refineries. Refinery throughput means the monthly volume of crude oil fed to the crude unit at the refinery.

The company's petchem segment is also likely to show an improved performance compared to the December quarter as polyethylene (PE) and polypropelene (PP) cracks have improved sequentially. The Petchem segment had reported a loss of Rs 616 crore during the December quarter.

Reported Gross Refining Margin (GRM) is likely to be at $13.1 per barrel, with gross marketing margin at Rs 4.5 per liter.

For the March quarter, Indian Oil may report fuel over-recoveries of Rs 3,100 crore, compared to under-recoveries of Rs 5,700 crore in December. Over-recoveries is the opposite of under-recoveries, which is the notional loss oil companies incur due to the difference between the selling price and the procurement price.

Analysts are also expecting Indian Oil to report an inventory loss of nearly Rs 2,600 crore this quarter, which may be a $1.5 per barrel loss in refining and $0.6 per barrel loss in marketing.

Shares of Indian Oil have gained 9 percent so far this year, in-line with its peers HPCL (up 9 percent) and BPCL (up 7 percent).