Tata Motors profits soar on strong Jaguar Land Rover sales

India's largest carmaker Tata Motors reported a three-fold increase in quarterly profits Monday, boosted by strong sales of luxury British unit Jaguar Land Rover and a one-off insurance payment.

Consolidated net profit for the three months to the end of March 2016 rose to 51.8 billion rupees ($771 million) from 17.2 billion rupees a year ago, the Mumbai-based company said in a report.

That was well above the estimate in a survey of 25 analysts by Bloomberg News who predicted that the car manufacturer would report net profits of 35.3 billion rupees for the fourth quarter.

Tata said its profits had been lifted by strong worldwide sales of Jaguar Land Rover as well as money recouped from a massive chemical blast in China's Tianjin last year that killed 161 people.

"Exceptional items for the quarter includes further insurance and other recoveries of Rs. 555 crores (5.55 billion rupees) on account of the vehicles damaged at Tianjin Port explosion in Jaguar Land Rover business," Tata said in its statement.

Tata said in November that it had lost 5,800 cars in the explosion last August.

Tata Motors is hugely reliant on revenues from JLR, which it bought for $2.3 billion from Ford in 2008 at the height of the global financial crisis.

It said JLR net sales jumped by 19 percent.

Investors were upbeat ahead of the earnings announcement with shares of Tata Motors, part of sprawling tea-to-steel conglomerate Tata, rising 4.3 percent on the Bombay Stock Exchange on Monday.