Making progress: Employees work at Adani Green’s renewable energy park in the western state of Gujarat. India is developing a 30GW hybrid – wind and solar – renewable energy project on one of the largest salt deserts in the world. — AP
MUMBAI: Adani Green Energy Ltd raises US$1.36bil for a massive renewable energy project as the Indian conglomerate owned by billionaire Gautam Adani continues to regain lender confidence following a brutal short-seller attack earlier this year.
The debt facility was secured from a consortium of eight international banks, including BNP Paribas, Rabobank, DBS Bank Ltd, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc and Standard Chartered Plc, the company said in an exchange filing yesterday.
This enhances the funding pool for the world’s largest green energy park at Khavda in western India to US$3bil since the project’s financing commenced in March 2021.
Shares of the company rose as much as 14.4% in Mumbai after the announcement was made, set for the biggest surge since July last year.
This pared this year’s plunge to 34%, a reminder of the deep blow dealt by Hindenburg Research’s bombshell report in January.
The short-seller accused Adani Group of wide-ranging allegations of corporate malfeasance that lopped off more than US$150bil of its market value at one point. The group has strongly denied the allegations.
The latest funding added to mounting evidence that the ports-to-power conglomerate is returning to business as usual and looking to draw a line over the Hindenburg episode that plunged the tycoon and his aides into months of damage control.
Adani Group, whose stronghold on India’s infrastructure has helped its recovery, secured a US$3.5bil refinancing, backing from a US government agency for a Sri Lanka port project and investments from GQG Partners and Qatar Investment Authority in the past few months.
The hybrid energy project, with wind and solar facilities in the deserts of Gujarat, Adani’s home state, will have a capacity of 17GW.
That generation, roughly equal to the total installed electricity capacity of Portugal, would bolster Adani Green’s target of 45GW renewable capacity by 2030 and India’s pledge to be net-zero by 2070.
“The funding not only validates our expertise as a developer and operator of strategically vital renewable energy projects but also demonstrates the trust by our financiers in our strategic vision,” said Amit Singh, Adani Green’s chief executive officer, in the statement filed to exchanges.
India’s Supreme Court concluded hearings in a regulatory probe last month investigating Hindenburg’s allegations against the conglomerate.
While the top court reserved its verdict on the probe, it said last week that it won’t take investigative media reports on the conglomerate as the “gospel truth,” stoking a relief rally in Adani stocks. — Bloomberg
