ONGC and MRPL were all pumped up considering the delivery of the first shipment of oil from ONGC's recent acquisition in Sudan will manifest on Thursday.

News of the first consignment saw ONGC spurting 6.04% to Rs 394.80 and MRPL soaring 13.10% to Rs 13.42. Volumes of close to 100,000 ONGC shares and over 300,000 MRPL shares were registered on BSE by 11:20 IST.

The two scrips seem to be celebrating the news that the first consignment of 80,000 metric tonnes of Nile Blend crude from the Greater Nile Oil Project in Sudan will be delivered today to ONGC's refinery at Mangalore. ONGC had only recently acquired a substantial stake in the Sudanese oil exploring company.

But some analysts contest the reckoning that the scrips have been boosted by reports of the delivery of oil. Rather, they feel that this delivery was already anticipated by the market and the positive influence has already been accounted for in the price. In fact, they contend that speculation over a voluminous dividend and impressive results is actually driving the two scrips. Already, ONGC has declared an interim dividend of Rs 17 per share. Players expect the full dividend for FY 2002-03 to be around Rs 23-24 per share.

Industry watchers believe that the crude that will be supplied to MRPL, in turn, would immensely benefit the refinery. MRPL's may even see a turnaround in the days to come, they reckon. ONGC recently acquired a 26% stake in MRPL. Already, MRPL, over the last few months, has seen capacity utilisation go up from 40% to 90%.

ONGC's financial performance has been impressive of late. For the third quarter ended 31 December 2002, ONGC recorded an 84% rise in net profit to Rs 2,593.47 crore (Rs 25.93 billion) on a 35% increase in net sales to Rs 7,604.99 crore (Rs 76.04 billion).

MRPL posted a loss of Rs 130.3 crore (Rs 1.3 billion) compared to a loss of Rs 36.80 crore in the corresponding period of the previous year. Net sales increased by 89.8% to Rs 2,316.11 crore (Rs 23.16 billion) from Rs 1,220.50 crore (Rs 12.2 billion) in DQ 2001.