Bonds issued by companies of Indian billionaire Gautam Adani hit distressed levels in US trading after his flagship firm Adani Enterprises on Wednesday abruptly called off its Rs 20,000 crore follow-on public offering, Mint reported.
Bonds are considered distressed when their yields, which move inversely to prices, are at least 10 percentage points over those of comparable US Treasuries.
Closer home, equities of the conglomerate continued to tank as its flagship stock Adani Enterprises shares fell by 23.82% on the Bombay Stock Exchange. Shares of other group stocks also fell significantly – Adani Ports (7.23%), Adani Power (4.98%), Adani Transmission (10%), Adani Green Energy (10%), Adani Total Gas (10%) and Adani Wilmar (5%) to Rs 421.45.
This is the sixth consecutive trading session in which shares of the Adani Group continued to decline.
Meanwhile, bonds of Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone Limited registered the biggest loss in global secondary trading on Wednesday as they plunged 20 cents on the dollar to 69.75 cents. Similarly, at least four other bonds of Adani Ports plunged to distressed levels by dropping to 69 cents or lower.
Adani Green Energy’s bond fell more than 12 cents on the dollar to 66.75 cents in market trading. One bond of Adani Green declined 9 cents on the dollar but did not hit the distressed level.
This marks a stunning setback for Adani as some bonds of these two companies yield over 30% in secondary markets, which is way higher than the average investment grade yield of 4.96%, Mint reported.
On Wednesday, Adani Enterprises decided not to go ahead with a follow-on public offer of shares and return the money to investors.
“Today the market has been unprecedented, and our stock price has fluctuated over the course of the day,” Adani said. “Given these extraordinary circumstances, the company’s board felt that going ahead with the issue will not be morally correct.”
Shares in the billionaire’s conglomerate have plunged since United States-based short-seller Hindenburg Research on January 24 made wide-ranging allegations that the Adani Group was pulling off the “largest con in corporate history”.
It claimed that the conglomerate has over the decades been involved in stock manipulation, accounting fraud, used offshore shells for money laundering and siphoned money from listed companies.
Adani Group has invoked nationalism to defend itself and called the report a “calculated attack” on India and its institutions. Hindenburg, in turn, said that Adani Group cannot conceal its fraud by draping itself in the national flag.
Amid the crisis, US-based lender Citigroup has stopped extending margin loans to its clients against securities of the Adani Group, Bloomberg reported.
“In recent days, we have seen a dramatic price drop of Adani issued securities,” Citigroup said in an internal memo, according to Bloomberg. “Stock and bond prices have plummeted following the negative news around the group’s financial health.”
The development came after Swiss lender Credit Suisse stopped accepting bonds of Adani Group firms as collateral for margin loans, Bloomberg reported.
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