Adani Group on Sunday said it has repaid loans aggregating $2.65 billion to complete a prepayment programme ahead of the March 31 deadline to cut overall leverage in an attempt to win back investor trust post a damning report of a US short seller.
In a statement, Adani group said it has repaid $2.15 billion of loans that were taken by pledging shares in the conglomerate’s listed firms and also another $500 million in loans taken for the acquisition of Ambuja Cement.
The announcement comes within days of the group saying it has pre-paid Rs 7,374 crore (about $902 million) loans that were taken pledging shares in four group companies. This has now been scaled up to $2.15 billion.
While Adani group has not detailed the source of money for repayment of loans, these came within days of the promoters selling minority stakes in four listed companies to US-based GQG Partners for Rs 15,446 crore.
“In continuation of promoters’ commitment to repay the promoter leverage, Adani has completed full prepayment of margin linked share backed financing aggregating to $2.15 billion, well before the committed timeline of March 31, 2023,” it said. “In addition to above, promoters have also prepaid a $500 million facility taken for Ambuja acquisition financing.”
This, it said, was in line with promoters’ commitment to increase equity contribution and promoters have now infused $2.6 billion out of 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 statement said.
The last announcement of prepayment of share-backed financing of Rs 7,374 crore on March 7 was followed by more shares belonging to companies of the group being pledged as security for loans taken by the group’s flagship firm.
On March 8, SBICap Trustee in notices to stock exchanges had stated that a further 0.99 per cent shares in Adani Green Energy Ltd were pledged “for the benefits of the lenders” of Adani Enterprises Ltd. An additional 0.76 per cent shares in Adani Transmission Ltd were also pledged to banks, the trustee said.
With the latest pledge, the total shares in Adani Green Energy Ltd — the group’s renewable energy company — that were encumbered with SBICap was 2 per cent. In the case of Adani Transmission, this came to 1.32 per cent.
The March 7 statement stated that the repayment of Rs 7,374 crore will release pledge on shares in four group companies, and together with repayments done earlier, the group has prepaid $2.016 billion of share-backed financing.