All Adani stocks in red on report of U.S. probe; Adani Total Gas, Adani Energy top losers

Shares of billionaire Gautam Adani-led Adani Group companies tumbled up to 8% in intraday trade on Monday amid a report that the U.S. government had widened its probe against the port-to-power conglomerate over suspicions of bribery. In contrast, the equity benchmarks Sensex and Nifty were trading in positive terrain, paring early losses.

All ten listed companies of the Gujarat-based conglomerate were under stress today, falling in the range of 2-8%, led by Adani Total Gas, Adani Ports, and Adani Energy Solutions.

Adani Total Gas shares declined as much as 7.78% on the BSE, while Adani Energy Solutions and Adani Ports and SEZ fell 6.9% and 4.2%, respectively. The group flagship Adani Enterprises tumbled as much as 5% during the session so far.

Among others, Adani Power, Adani Wilmar, Adani Green Energy, and NDTV were down in the range of 2% to 4%. 

In a similar trend, cement entities ACC and Ambuja Cements shed up to 4% during the trade so far.

Meanwhile, the BSE Sensex was up 150 points, or 0.21%, at 72,792 levels, while the NSE Nifty traded 44 points, or 0.2%, higher at 22,067 levels, at the time of reporting.

On March 15, Bloomberg reported that the U.S. investigators were looking into whether an Adani group entity or its affiliates, or people linked to the company including Gautam Adani, were involved in bribing officials in India for preferential treatment on energy projects.

The US Attorney's office for the Eastern District of New York and the Department of Justice's fraud unit are handling the investigation, which is also looking at Indian renewable energy company Azure Power Global Ltd.

Meanwhile, Adani Group is yet to issue any clarification on the development.

In a separate development, a PTI report says that Adani group is planning to invest over ₹1.2 lakh crore (about $14 billion) across its portfolio companies that range from ports to energy, airports, commodities, cement and media in the financial year 2024-25. The projected capital expenditure (capex) for FY25 is 40% higher than the estimated capex of around $10 billion incurred in FY24.

Last month, global brokerage Jefferies initiated a ‘Buy’ call on Adani Enterprises Ltd (AEL), saying its EBITDA is expected to double from FY23 to FY26 and will grow more than 3x by FY28. The agency in its report says with new businesses of the airport and green hydrogen, it expects EBITDA to grow 3x over FY24-FY28.

Besides, U.S.-based rating agency Moody's Investor Services also changed its outlook on four Adani group companies to ‘stable’ from ‘negative’ earlier, while affirming the ratings of eight companies. The ratings agency has changed its outlook on Adani Green Energy, Adani Green Energy Restricted Group 1, Adani Transmission Step-On, and Adani Electricity Mumbai, to 'stable' from 'negative'. The outlook was affirmed to be "stable" for Adani Energy Solutions Restricted Group 1, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, Adani International Container Terminal and Adani Green Energy Restricted Group 2.

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