Just when everyone thought the Adani-Hindenburg saga was over, the US-based short-selling firm responded to Sebi's show-cause notice with a combative blog post. Earlier this week, Hindenburg labelled the notice as nonsense and concocted, calling it "an attempt to silence and intimidate those who expose corruption and fraud perpetrated by the most powerful individuals in India."
However, this recent clash between Hindenburg and Sebi has brought to light a new entity behind the saga which eventually wiped out nearly $153 billion market value last year, Kingdon Capital.
About Kingdon Capital
Established in April 1983, Kingdon Capital is an investment management company, originally founded by Mark Kingdon. Since 2012, it has been a registered investment adviser under the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The company is currently based out of New York and manages a portfolio valued at $915.76 million, as per Fintel.
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Who is Mark Kingdon?
The owner of Kingdon Capital has over 50 years of experience in the asset management industry. He has managed $623.21 million in client assets on a discretionary basis (as of Jan 1' 2023), as per SEC filings cited by NDTV report.
Kingdon's career originally began in 1973 at AT&T Inc., where he was responsible for overseeing pension funds. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Economics from Columbia College and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Why has the company come under the radar?
Among the recent disclosures, the market watchdog's show cause notice revealed that Hindenburg had initially shared its Adani research exclusively with Kingdon Capital Management before making it public.
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The notice also signaled a potential profit-sharing deal between the two firms, with the short seller being entitled to as much as 30 per cent of any profits from trading securities based on its research.
The paper has been sent to Hindenburg, its founder Nathan Anderson, Kingdon’s founder-owner Mark Kingdon and K India Opportunities Fund. All the entities are reportedly part of Sebi’s investigation into the trading activities around Adani Enterprises.
The flagship company of the Gautam Adani-owned conglomerate has since been on a volatile ride. As of Thursday, the share price of the company has lost around a per cent on the National Stock Exchange.
"To this day Adani hasn’t directly addressed the findings from our research or from dozens of media investigations, instead offering deflections and blanket denials," the short-seller said in its blogpost.
