Hindustan Unilever’s (HUL) volume growth came in muted at 4% for Q1FY17 vs. our expectation of 5%. As per Ind AS, net sales grew 3.6% YoY to | 7987.7 crore (I-direct estimate: | 8434.2 crore). Sales growth in home care, personal care, foods & refreshments was 6.8%, 2.1%, 4.7% & 5.4%, YoY, respectively .EBITDA margins improved 85 bps to 20.1% (I-direct estimate: 17.4%). Soft input costs (down 101 bps as % of sales) & lower A&P spend (down 56 bps as % of sales) aided in margin expansion . PAT increased 9.8% YoY to | 1173.9 crore (I-direct estimate: | 1049 crore) on the back of higher EBITDA and exceptional gain of | 70.8 crore mainly due to one-time write-back of provision. HUL has proposed setting up of a plant in Assam at an investment of | 1000 crore to increase production capacity of personal care products. It is expected to be operational in early 2017. ICICI Securities Limited maintain BUY recommendation with a target price of | 1000/share.Trendlyne has 21 reports on HINDUNILVR updated in the last year from 6 brokers with an average target of Rs 870.4. Brokers have a rating for HINDUNILVR with 2 price upgrades in past 6 months and 1 downgrades,3 price downgrades,1 upgrade,5 price upgrades in past 1 Year.