The Adani Group has said it has made a full prepayment of margin-linked share-backed financing worth $2.15 billion and also increased equity in its subsidiary Ambuja by prepaying a $500 million facility taken for its acquisition financing.
"In continuation of promoters’ commitment to repay the promoter leverage, Adani has completed full prepayment of margin linked share backed financing aggregating to USD 2.15 billion, well before the committed timeline of 31 March 2023. In addition to the above, promoters have also prepaid USD 500 million facilities taken for Ambuja acquisition financing," Adani group said in a statement.
The company said this is in line with promoters’ "commitment" to increase equity contribution. With this, the promoters have now infused $2.6 billion out of a total acquisition value of $6.6 billion for Ambuja and ACC.
"The entire prepayment program of $2.65 billion has been completed within 6 weeks, which testifies the strong liquidity management and access to capital at sponsor level, supplementing the solid capital prudency adopted at all portfolio companies," the company added.
The Gautam Adani-led group had last week prepaid share-backed financing of ₹7,374 crore ($902 million) ahead of maturity in April 2025 to reduce the overall promoter leverage backed by Adani firms shares. This repayment will release the shares of the four Adani-listed companies -- Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone Ltd, Adani Enterprises Ltd, Adani Transmission Ltd, and Adani Green Energy Ltd.
Around 155 million shares of Adani Ports, 11.8% of the promoters’ holding, will be released; 31 million shares of Adani group flagship company Adani Enterprises, 4% of promoters’ holdings; 36 million shares of Adani Transmission, 4.5% of promoters’ holding; and Adani Green Energy's 11 million shares, 1.2% of promoters’ holdings, will be released.
The developments come in the backdrop of a recent controversial report by the U.S.-based short-seller Hindenburg Research that triggered a sharp sell-off in Adani group stocks. Overall, the stocks lost nearly ₹12 lakh crore in market value in more than a month after the report was released on January 24, 2023.
Earlier this month, GQG Partners, a leading US-based Global Equity investment boutique, had also announced the completion of a ₹15,446 crore in a series of secondary block trade transactions in the Adani portfolio's listed companies - Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, Adani Green Energy, Adani Transmission, and Adani Enterprises.
The shares of nine out of 10 listed companies of the Adani group gained momentum on Monday after witnessing mixed trading last Friday. Flagship company Adani Enterprises rallied is trading 3.78% up in the early trade, while Adani Green, Adani Power, Adani Transmission, Adani Total Gas, Adani Wilmar, and NDTV are close to or have hit the upper circuit by trading up at 4.99%, 4.98%, 5%, 5%, 3.26% and 3.25%, respectively. The shares of Ambuja Cements are also up at 1.26% today, while the Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone stock is trading 0.92% higher. Only ACC stock is trading down at 0.049%.
Notably, the conglomerate borrowed over $10 billion in foreign currency bonds between July 2015 and 2022, of which $1.15 billion of bonds matured in 2020 and 2022. The bonds worth $650 million of Adani Ports are due for payment in 2024, while the $750 million and $500 million bonds of Adani Green Energy will mature next year.
