The aftermath of Adani’s indictment: In the wake of Gautam Adani’s indictment on bribery and fraud charges, the Adani Group saw its companies lose USD 27 bn in value by market close yesterday, bringing its combined market cap to USD 142.6 bn, Reuters reports.

What went down? US prosecutors formally charged Adani and seven others with involvement in a USD 265 mn bribery and fraud scheme, promising contracts that would have yielded USD 2 bn in net income over 20 years. The charges also include raising capital through false and misleading statements, with USD 2 bn in syndicated loans and another USD 1 bn from bond offerings sold to US-based investors.

Adani Green Energy scrapped its USD 600 mn bond issuance, which was offered to the market mere hours before the charges made the news. The debt offering was almost 3x oversubscribed, drawing over USD 1.9 bn in orders, Bloomberg reports.

Kenya calls off USD 2.5 bn projects with Adani: Kenyan President William Ruto called off two major projects with Adani, including a USD 2 bn airport project at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport — that would have seen Adani add a second runway and upgrade the passenger terminal in exchange for a 30-year lease — and a USD 736 mn power transmission line project, Reuters reports.

Its shareholders were not spared: US wealth manager GQG Partners, Adani’s fourth-largest shareholder with USD 10 bn invested in the group, saw its shares fall 19%, wiping AUD 1.5 bn off its market cap, the Wall Street Journal reports. GQG emphasized that 90% of its assets are unrelated to Adani Group, in a statement (pdf), and launched a USD 65.1 mn share buyback program, capitalizing on the fact that its stock was undervalued and sending the stock up in trading this morning, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Adani has gone on the defensive, rejecting the accusations as “baseless,” and reaffirmed that “Adani Group has always upheld and is steadfastly committed to maintaining the highest standards of governance, transparency and regulatory compliance across all jurisdictions of its operations,” the group said in a statement.

Not Adani’s first controversy: Adani has had a sackful of allegations over the years, from accusations of market manipulation and fraud schemes by US short seller Hindenburg Research, which triggered massive share sell-offs in January 2023 and again in August, to allegations of using offshore funds to trade its own shares, to protests over the Kenya airport project.

MARKETS THIS MORNING-

Asian markets are in the green as Wall Street saw a fourth day of gains, and Japan came out with cooler inflation figures for October. Wall Street futures are slightly lower this morning, though the indices are still expected to close the week on a high.

ADX

9,313

-1% (YTD: -2.8%)

DFM

4,730

-0.7% (YTD: +16.5%)

Nasdaq Dubai UAE20

3,879

-1.9% (YTD: +1%)

USD : AED CBUAE

Buy 3.67

Sell 3.67

EIBOR

4.5% o/n

4.4% 1 yr

TASI

11,841

-0.2% (YTD: -1.1%)

EGX30

30,632

+0.1% (YTD: +23.1%)

S&P 500

5,951

+0.7% (YTD: +24.3%)

FTSE 100

8,149

+0.8% (YTD: +5.4%)

Euro Stoxx 50

4,756

+0.6% (YTD: +5.2%)

Brent crude

USD 73.76

+1.3%

Natural gas (Nymex)

USD 3.3

+3.4%

Gold

USD 2,699

+0.9%

BTC

USD 98,334.9

+4.5% (YTD: +132.7%)

THE CLOSING BELL-

The ADX fell 1% yesterday on turnover of AED 1.2 bn. The index is down 2.8% YTD.

In the green: Umm Al Qaiwain General Investment Co. (+6.9%), Palms Sports (+4.3%) and Abu Dhabi Ship Building Co. (+4.3%).

In the red: Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank (-4.7%), Abu Dhabi National Building Materials Co. (-4.4%) and Easy Lease Motor Cycle Rental (-3.9%).

Over on the DFM, the index fell 0.7% on turnover of AED 235.9 mn. Meanwhile, Nasdaq Dubai closed down 1.9%.

CORPORATE ACTIONS-

Budget retailer Union Coop has tapped a legal advisor to look into changing the company’s legal status into a public joint stock company, according to a DFM disclosure (pdf).

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