Adani is said to plan raising Rs 10,072 crore for flagship firm

By P R Sanjai, Baiju Kalesh and Saikat Das

Billionaire Gautam Adani’s flagship firm is considering raising around Rs 10,000 crore ($1.2 billion) to Rs 12,000 crore through a share sale, according to people familiar with the matter, a move that would follow a separate recent fundraising deal at his power transmission unit.

Adani Enterprises Ltd. may seek to raise funds through a so-called qualified institutional placement, or QIP, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private.

ICICI Securities Ltd., Jefferies Financial Group Inc. and SBI Capital Markets Ltd. are helping the port-to-power conglomerate on a share sale that could take place as early as September, the people said.

Adani Group is seeking institutional investors including from the US as part of its efforts to expand its shareholder base and draw more research analysts to cover the firm, one of the people said. IFR had earlier reported on the fundraising plan.

Deliberations are ongoing and details of the fundraising including size and timing may change, the people said. An Adani Group representative couldn’t immediately comment when reached by phone. Representatives for the banks declined to comment.

Adani Enterprises in May approved raising as much as 166 billion rupees through methods including a share sale to institutions in one or more tranches.

The transaction would follow Adani Energy Solutions Ltd.’s Rs 8,370 crore share sale to institutional investors last week. Adani Energy’s offering saw demand of about six times the base deal size with interest from utility-focused US investors entering India for the first time, as well as sovereign wealth funds and insurers.

A successful fundraising deal by Adani Enterprises would help the billionaire’s group recover confidence from global investors after US short-seller Hindenburg Research accused it of widespread fraud and corporate malfeasance in early 2023, leading to a rout that at one point erased more than Rs 12,58,950 crore ($150 billion) from its market value. Adani has repeatedly denied these claims.

In another sign of the group’s rebound after the short seller attack, Adani Enterprises last week posted a 115 per cent jump in quarterly profit, boosted by solid revenues at its airports and mining businesses.