Fraud can't be obfuscated by nationalism: Hindenburg to Adani Group

Hindenburg Research on Monday said that the Adani group is shifting the focus away from substantive issues and has instead stoked a nationalistic narrative by claiming that its research report amounted to a "calculated attack on India."

"Our report asked 88 specific questions of the Adani Group. In its response, Adani failed to specifically answer 62 of them. Instead, it mainly grouped questions together in categories and provided generalized deflections," the activist short seller says in its rebuttal to the 413-page response by Adani.

In other instances, Adani simply pointed to its own filings and declared the questions or relevant matters settled, again failing to substantively address the issues raised, the U.S.-based research firm says.

"We note that the core allegations of our report – focused on numerous suspect transactions with offshore entities – were left completely unaddressed," says Hindenburg Research.

This comes days after the short seller accused that the Adani group of engaging in billions of dollars in suspicious dealings with its chairman's brother, Vinod Adani, and his labyrinth of offshore shell entities, raising questions about stock and accounting manipulation. The alleged offshore entities included 38 entities in Mauritius, along with others in the U.A.E., Cyprus, Singapore, and various Caribbean islands.

"In its response, Adani did not seem to dispute the existence of these transactions and made no effort to explain their obvious irregularities. Instead, Adani bizarrely argued that Vinod Adani is not a related party to the Adani Group, and that there are no disclosable conflicts relating to the transactions that have collectively moved billions of U.S. dollars through Adani Group entities, largely through offshore shell entities," says Hindenburg Research.

The research firm founded by Nathan Anderson says that a large portion of its report was dedicated to outlining a web of opaque offshore entities, often with connections to Vinod Adani, that seemed to hold nothing but billions of U.S. dollars worth of stock in Adani listed companies.

"In terms of substance, Adani's '413 page' response only included about 30 pages focused on issues related to our report. The remainder of the response consisted of 330 pages of court records, along with 53 pages of high-level financials, general information, and details on irrelevant corporate initiatives, such as how it encourages female entrepreneurship and the production of safe vegetables," says Hindenburg Research.

The report further says that the Adani Group has attempted to conflate its meteoric rise and the wealth of its chairman, Gautam Adani, with the success of India itself. India is a vibrant democracy and an emerging superpower but its future is being held back by the Adani Group, which has "draped itself in the Indian flag while systematically looting the nation," the report alleges.