HCL Tech March-quarter profit up 3.6 percent, lags estimates

MUMBAI (Reuters) - HCL Technologies Ltd , India's fourth-largest software services exporter by revenue, reported a 3.6 percent rise in quarterly net profit on Tuesday, lagging street estimates as margins dropped due to currency volatility. Consolidated net income for HCL Technologies under U.S. accounting standards rose to 16.83 billion rupees ($267 million) in the quarter ended March 31 from 16.24 billion rupees a year earlier, the company said in a statement. Analysts, on average, had expected the company to report a net profit of 18.15 billion rupees, according to Thomson Reuters data. The company's standalone net profit in the quarter grew by about 11 percent. HCL Technologies said its EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) margin, a key measure of profitability, dropped to 22.5 percent in the March quarter from 26.7 percent in the year ago period. ($1 = 63.1092 rupees) (Reporting by Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Anupama Dwivedi)