New Delhi, Jan. 22 -- Eternal Ltd's December quarter (Q3FY26) results were encouraging on many counts. Adjusted Ebitda (before employee stock options and after lease rentals) soared by 63% sequentially to Rs.364 crore, mainly led by quick commerce business Blinkit, which clocked a small profit of Rs.4 crore versus a loss of Rs.156 crore in Q2. This is a significant achievement, given that it has largely shifted to an owned-inventory-led model from a marketplace for third-party sellers since Q2. Notably, almost 90% of net order value (NOV) came from owned inventory versus 80% in Q2.

The turnaround in Blinkit's profitability could be attributed to the sharp improvement in contribution per order - i.e. profit per order before fixed costs. S...