Adani Group overcomes impact of short sellers, now focusses on rapid expansion

It seems that the Adani Group associated with various businesses has now completely come out of the influence of short sellers. Within a week the group opened a $1.2 billion copper plant, bought a port in Odisha and increased its stake in a cement company. It has also tied up with Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries, which is considered a rival. The Group, through its filings and press releases to the stock exchanges over the past week, highlighted expansion and investment in its core port business, diversification into metal refining, capital infusion into its two-year-old cement sector and the commissioning of its mega solar project. Continual progress has been announced.

It started on March 26 with Adani Ports' announcement of acquiring 95 per cent stake in Gopalpur Port at an enterprise value of Rs 3,350 crore. With this the number of ports under his control increased to 15. This is the highest number of ports owned by any private company in the country. After this, the group's flagship company Adani Enterprises Ltd. On March 28, it announced the first phase of the world's largest copper manufacturing plant at a single location in Mundra, Gujarat. This marks the group's entry into the field of metal refining.

The total $1.2 billion (about Rs 10,000 crore) plant has helped India join China and other countries. These countries are increasing copper production rapidly. It is an important metal for less use of fossil fuels like coal. Critical to the energy transition, electric vehicles (EVs), charging infrastructure, solar photovoltaics (PV), wind and batteries all require copper.

The same day, group chairman Gautam Adani and his family announced an investment of Rs 6,661 crore to increase stake in Ambuja Cements, the country's second largest cement company, to 66.7 per cent. A day later, the group's renewable energy arm Adani Green Energy Ltd. announced the launch of its 775 MW solar power projects in Khavra, Gujarat. Khavda is the place where it is building a huge solar farm to set up 30 GW capacity power projects from solar energy. This is part of the group's plan to achieve a target of 45 GW capacity by 2030.