LIC loses more than ₹1,400 crore in six Adani stocks in just a day; details here

Adani News today: Nine out of ten Adani stocks on Thursday closed in the red following fresh allegations made by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) that the Adani Group's family associates invested millions of dollars through "opaque" Mauritius funds in its own firms.

On NSE, Adani Enterprises share price ended 3.51% lower, Adani Total Gas share price closed down 2.24% , Adani Energy Solutions share price concluded 3.53% lower, Adani Green Energy share price ended 3.76% lower, Adani Ports & Special Economic share price settled down 3.18%, ACC share price closed 0.73% higher, Ambuja Cements share price ended down 3.66%, NDTV share price closed 1.92% lower, Adani Power share price was down by 1.93% and Adani Wilmar share price closed 2.70% down, on Thursday, August 31.

Also Read: Adani stocks fall up to 4%; m-cap of all 10 stocks drops over ₹35,000 crore in a day

According to exchanges data, the total market-capitalisation of all 10 stocks was almost 10.84 lakh crore in the previous session but fell to almost 10.49 lakh crore on August 31, losing about ₹35,000 crore in a single day. Out of the ₹35,000 crore, Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) lost ₹1,439.8 crore value in six Adani Group companies in just one session. 

As on June 30, LIC held 9.12% in Adani Ports & Special Economic, 4.26% in Adani Enterprises, over 6% in Adani Total Gas, ACC, and Ambuja Cements, according to trendlyne data.

Table: Losses borne by LIC on Thursday due to fall in Adani stocks 

This is the second claim against the Adani Group, which comes eight months after Hindenburg Research accused the Indian giant of taking part in a decades-long scam to manipulate stock prices and conduct accounting fraud. In its analysis, Hindenburg cited issues with Adani Group, including inappropriate use of offshore tax havens and high debt levels that caused the group's stock price to plummet.

According to the OCCRP report, two business associates, Chang Chung-Ling and Nasser Ali Shaban Ahli, made significant investments in Adani Group stock from 2013 to 2018—a time when the ports-to-energy conglomerate experienced a rapid rise to become one of India's biggest and most influential companies.

Through two Mauritius-based funds that were supervised by a Dubai-based company managed by a known employee of Vinod Adani, Nasser Ali Shaban Ahli of the United Arab Emirates and Chang Chung-Ling of Taiwan traded hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of Adani group stock over a period of years.

According to OCCRP, the only beneficiaries of Mauritius-based firms through which the money appeared to flow are two of Vinod Adani's close associates: the chairman Gautam Adani and elder brother of the group founder.

According to a letter cited by OCCRP, market regulator SEBI received proof of potentially unusual stock market behaviour by the Adani Group in early 2014.

However, on the OCCRP allegations, the Adani Group on Thursday termed them as "recycled allegations".

"We categorically reject these recycled allegations. These news reports appear to be yet another concerted bid by Soros-funded interests supported by a section of the foreign media to revive the meritless Hindenburg report. In fact, this was anticipated, as was reported by the media last week," the company said in an exchange filing.

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