New Delhi:
The recent indictment by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) of Adani Group officials is nothing but a frivolous expense and once President-elect Donald Trump assumes office, such wasteful exercises involving the government offices with overseas businesses will probably fade away, ace global investor Mark Mobius told news agency IANS on Tuesday.
His comment came as serious questions are now being raised regarding the independence of the US DoJ and its indictment against the Adani Group, and whether it is being used for “politically motivated actions”.
“My guess is that Donald Trump will come in and whoever he appoints to run the Justice Department will say, what are you guys doing? Sticking your nose into Indian businesses? Spending all this money on a trial which probably won’t go anywhere?” Mr Mobius told news agency IANS.
Mr Mobius, who runs the Mobius EM Opportunities Fund for emerging markets, further stated that there is a “good chance” that the Justice Department will move away from the Adani probe and the trial.
“I believe that there would be another implication where the Justice Department will be reorganised in America, and will be asked to get less and less involved in overseas situations and more and more with domestic issues,” said the top investor.
The DoJ and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently filed an indictment and a civil complaint in the New York District Court against the top Adani Group officials. However, the Adani Group vehemently refuted the allegations, terming it ‘baseless’, and said it would seek legal recourse to defend itself.
According to Mobius, a lot of people are now beginning to realise that with Trump assuming office, “this DoJ situation in the US will probably go away”.
On Adani Portfolio stocks performing well despite the US-related developments, he said that the situation with the hedge funds going after the Adani Group seemed to have fizzled out.
“A lot of investors began to look at this and said, well, Adani is under pressure but at the end of the day, their business will continue to operate well and probably will continue to do well in the future,” Mr Mobius noted.
Adani stocks have roared back from initial hiccups, and are now surging almost daily on the Indian benchmark indices. They added more than Rs 2 lakh crore to their market cap in just a three-day rally.
A Bernstein report on Adani Group companies on Tuesday stated that the Group is currently in a much stronger position than it was during the Hindenburg attack in January 2023.
Despite facing some US-related developments, the Adani Group is on solid footing across four key areas: no share pledge, leverage, debt repayment and valuations, the report mentioned.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
