Apart from calling off buying Macquarie’s road assets, the Adani group has withdrawn from a series of acquisition opportunities, including of power plants, a retail firm, a power trader and road projects since January this year, say bankers. The focus of the group is to conserve cash and prepay debt rather than acquiring new assets.
“Till early this year, bankers would pitch every asset for sale with the Adani group. But now, the group is keen to expand their existing businesses, rather than acquiring stressed assets, so it is going slow on new acquisitions,” an investment banker said.
Since January this year, the group withdrew from the race to acquire SKS Power, a stressed coal-based power plant in Chhattisgarh. In February, the group called off a plan to acquire DB Power’s thermal power assets at an enterprise valuation of Rs 7,000 crore. In the same month, it pulled out to make an offer to PTC India, a power trader. Later, the group did not make an offer for Future Retail after submitting its expression of interest to buy the asset via a joint venture company. On Thursday, Adani Enterprises announced that it will not go ahead with acquiring Macquarie group’s two road companies at an enterprise valuation of Rs 3,100 crore.
Bankers said the group’s absence from the acquisition race has given an opportunity to foreign private equity players, which are keen to buy into Indian infrastructure projects. Top officials of American private equity giants Blackstone and KKR said they were keen to invest in the Indian infrastructure projects which gives good returns.