Gautam Adani Says 'Most Challenging' Year Ends In A Position Of 'Unprecedented Strength'

Billionaire Gautam Adani has said that his conglomerate ended a year of “extraordinary contrasts” in a “position of unprecedented strength”, overcoming attacks by a short seller and “various groups” opposed to Adani interests.

“About 12 months ago, our resilience was tested by an attack from an international short seller. This was further complicated as various groups with opposing interest to Adani leveraged the short seller's claim for their own objectives, aiming to harm our reputation by raising concerns about governance practices not just for our group but at the national level,” Adani said in a video message to the group’s employees.

Despite these challenges, “our integrity and governance were thoroughly validated by the Supreme Court-appointed committee,” he said, referring to the report of the panel that didn’t find any regulatory failure in the Hindenburg-Adani matter. “The unsubstantiated nature of the allegations against us only served to highlight the power of truth in our favour.”

While Adani underscored that there was a need to incorporate learnings into the processes to avoid such a thing in the future, he said the group companies’ response to the short seller attack was extraordinary. “We not only rebounded but also reported record-breaking results, ending our most challenging year in a position of unprecedented strength.”

The Adani portfolio companies' operating income surged by a record 47% in the first half of FY24 to over Rs 43,000 crore. The group also plans to invest a combined $100 billion over the next decade on the group's shift towards clean energy. And backing of marquee institutional investors, including GQG Partners, also lifted the sentiment. 

“Our financial health is now far more robust than ever before in our 30-year history and is marked by an expansion of our investor base with prestigious global entities like GQG Partners from the U.S., International Holding Co. from the Middle East, Total Energies from Europe and U.S. government's International Finance Development Corp.,” Adani said in his message.

“This is a clear validation of the trust and confidence investors place in the Adani brand,” he said. The group has accelerated expansion plans and is also taking up projects most other companies would not ever consider, he said, citing the world's largest renewable energy park to generate 30 GW of green power in Kutch and Dharavi redevelopment.

“If this were not enough, we also built one of the world's most difficult and deepest breakwaters for the Vizhinjam port in Kerala and accelerated the development of Navi Mumbai airport, which is being designed to handle a staggering 100 million passengers annually.”