VEDL Vedanta Limited

By Alex MacDonald

LONDON--India-focused Vedanta Resources PLC (VED.LN) said Friday it's confident that it will meet its debt covenants after cutting net debt and broadly increasing output for a range of commodities during the second financial quarter.

The U.K.-listed natural resources company said it expects net debt to fall below $8 billion as of the end of Sept. 30 when it reports its half year results. This compares with $8.5 billion at the end of March.

The company said that oil and gas output, its largest earnings driver, rose 6% on year to 205,361 barrels of oil equivalent in the three months ended Sept. 30.

Meanwhile its zinc operations in India, another key revenue contributor, produced 211,000 tons of refined zinc in the second financial quarter, up 17% compared with the same period a year before. Refined zinc output from its international operations however fell 20% on year to 63,000 tons due to an unplanned shutdown of its Skorpion zinc mine in Namibia.

Vedanta also said it has now resumed iron ore production at its operations in both the Indian states of Karnataka and Goa with its first iron ore export from Goa due this month.

Vedanta is also managing to turnaround its Zambian copper operations with copper output rising 39% on year to 47,000 tons in the second financial quarter.

Aluminum output in India also increased 5% on year to 233,000 tons.

Write to Alex MacDonald at alex.macdonald@wsj.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 09, 2015 03:04 ET (07:04 GMT)

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