Vedanta Limited reported record second quarter results on October 28 and used them to make a balance sheet claim its investors have heard promised before: net debt elimination, this time by the end of December. For the quarter ended September 30, 2026, the company reported its highest ever quarterly revenue of Rs25,812 crore, up 57 percent year on year, EBITDA of Rs9,938 crore, up 106 percent, and profit after tax from continuing operations of Rs6,202 crore, up 151 percent. It declared a first interim dividend of Rs5 a share.
The deleveraging is already most of the way there on the company’s numbers. Net debt fell by Rs4,624 crore in the quarter to Rs3,675 crore, taking net debt to EBITDA from 0.3 times to 0.1 times. Group chief financial officer Ajay Goel attributed the reduction to strong cash generation of Rs5,803 crore in the quarter. Chief executive Arun Misra told Reuters the company is on track to eliminate net debt by the end of the third quarter, which for Vedanta ends in December.
Price is doing much of the work. Reporting on the quarter noted spot zinc prices up about 35 percent year on year on tight supply and copper up about 44 percent, partly offset by lead down about 6 percent. Operationally, Zinc India’s mined metal production rose 5 percent year on year to 271,000 tonnes and silver production rose 20 percent to 173 tonnes, while Zinc International commissioned Phase II of the Gamsberg project in South Africa during the quarter, adding 200,000 tonnes a year of metal in concentrate capacity and taking that business to 500,000 tonnes a year.
The test is the one commodity balance sheets always face: the December target lands only if third quarter prices hold near second quarter levels and cash conversion repeats. What has changed is the distance left to travel. At Rs3,675 crore of net debt against a quarterly EBITDA run rate near Rs10,000 crore, the target no longer requires a heroic quarter, it requires an ordinary one, which is precisely why missing it would now be read as an operational failure rather than a market excuse.