Hindenburg Report 'gas And Fire', Our FPO, Investment Plans On Track: Adani

The Adani group’s operating companies are churning out Rs 1,100 crore of Ebitda (earnings before interest, depreciation, tax and amortisation) per week and the group’s investment plan in the hydrogen business remains on track, Chief Financial Officer Jugeshinder Singh told Business Standard on Sunday.

“There is no change in our follow-on public offer (FPO) plans and we are extremely confident of its success. The hydrogen project’s development is not contingent on this (the adverse report of short-seller Hindenburg). Our main focus remains on running our businesses,” Singh said.

The Rs 20,000-crore FPO is raising half the proceeds, with the rest to be mobilised over the next few months.

The FPO closes on Tuesday.

“‘Our message to our investors is that our group has large industrial companies and we remain fully invested. Our strategic partners are long-term and they too remain fully invested. The fundamental nature of our business is that everything (investment) is done based on operating assets. We hardly have to borrow anything or raise capital for general purposes,” Singh said.

Of the FPO proceeds, the group flagship, Adani Enterprises, is planning to invest Rs 11,000 crore in the hydrogen business and Rs 4,000 crore to reduce debt.

Calling Hindenburg’s report “gas and fire”, Singh said it deliberately used only part of the group’s disclosures in the past to make a misleading point.

“This is not a mistake but a malicious misrepresentation of facts and 68 out of their 88 questions are like this. For example, in the particular matter of DRI (directorate of revenue intelligence), the Supreme Court has given a final judgment. They know this as this was our disclosure in 15 different documents over several years. If they see any of these documents, they would know that they are wrong. They deliberately did this to mislead investors.”

Singh said the group companies were still collating data and would move the Securities and Exchange Board of India against the short-seller once data collation was completed.