Mahesh Jethmalani accuses Chinese spy of manipulating Adani stocks
- In Reports
- 09:41 PM, Jul 05, 2024
- Myind Staff
In a detailed post on social media platform 'X,' India’s one of the most senior lawyers and BJP leader Mahesh Jethmalani accused Chinese spy Anla Cheng and her husband Mark Kingdon of staging a scheme to financially harm the Adani Group.
According to Jethmalani, the couple hired Hindenburg Research to produce a damaging report on Adani and engaged Kotak Bank to set up a trading account for short-selling Adani shares. This allegedly allowed them to profit millions of dollars while severely impacting the Adani market cap and financially hurting Indian retail investors. Jethmalani suggested this was part of a broader strategy to undermine Adani, a significant competitor to Chinese interests in international projects.
Jethmalani also stated that the I.N.D.I. alliance in India supported Cheng and Kingdon's activities by framing their actions as a fight against "crony capitalism." He referenced a sworn statement by Shannon Van Sant, a former employee of Cheng's company SupChina, submitted to the US Congress, to support his claims.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) issued a show cause notice on June 26, accusing Hindenburg of "deliberately sensationalising and distorting certain facts" in their January 2023 report on the Adani Group. SEBI has given Hindenburg 21 days to respond.
In its 46-page notice, SEBI alleged that the relationship between Hindenburg and Kingdon began in the autumn of 2022, with Kingdon establishing positions in Adani stocks to benefit from their decline following the report's release.
In response, Hindenburg, published the notice on its website, stating it made only USD 4.1 million from its positions on Adani stocks. The firm criticised SEBI for not investigating the January 2023 report's evidence of Adani's alleged network of offshore shell entities and financial mismanagement.
Hindenburg pointed out that SEBI's notice conspicuously omitted naming Kotak Bank, which allegedly created and oversaw the offshore fund structure used by Hindenburg's partner to short-sell Adani. SEBI referred to Kotak as "KMIL" in the notice.
Image source: Reuters
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