Gautam Adani to Overhaul Family Offices to Bring Transparency in Operations: Report

Gautam Adani, chairman of Adani Enterprises, is looking to appoint auditors and a chief executive officer, to ensure transparency in the company's operations. This is as per a Bloomberg report.

Sources who were aware of the developments reportedly said that the founders of the conglomerate are in talks with two of the big six accounting firms to audit the family’s offices.

Adani family's two wealth offices are until now run informally with the help of group firm’s CFOs. With this overhaul, the company is hoping to make its image better and increase its reach globally to attract investors.

The new management team will oversee the shareholdings of the company's multiple portfolios, in addition, to preparing financial reports for the disclosures the family wants to make.

It is uncommon for billionaires to appoint a global auditor and engage in disclosures, especially for family offices where discretion and secrecy is preferred.

The hiring process is underway for a team of about five people. The team would be overseen by a CEO and a chief investment officer. They will report to the group’s chief financial officer and eventually to the billionaire-founder.

The move is aimed at ensuring transparency in accounting and managing practices of the company’s wealth after it faced intense scrutiny from US-based short-seller Hinderburg Research last year.

It stated that the company was opaque in in its operations and control of its entities. It criticised the conglomerate for using a complicated web of offshore entities to control a large stake in their listed business than disclose to exchanges. However, the company had denied all the charges.

All these accusation saw the company loose more than $150 billion in market value at one point last year.