One in every four air passengers in India flies through an Adani airport, Gautam Adani the chairman of the diversified conglomerate Adani Group, informed the shareholders of Adani Enterprises Limited (AEL) on Monday.

Making an announcement of the 25 per cent market share achieved by the group in airports business, Adani said, “No airport business in any large country has achieved a 25 per cent share of the total passenger traffic.”

Addressing the annual general meeting for Adani Group’s flagship firm AEL, Gautam Adani informed that the airport business — part of AEL — will increase the “focus to include non-passenger revenue and nurturing a range of possibilities within both physical and digital infrastructure.”

Airport network expansion

AEL, through Adani Airports Holding, is developing a pan-India airport network with existing operations of airports in Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Mangaluru and signed concession agreements for Guwahati, Jaipur and Thiruvananthapuram.

The company is now in the process of acquiring the Mumbai and Navi Mumbai International Airports, Adani told the shareholders.

Expressing confidence on India’s long-term growth journey. Adani said, “India will be a $5 trillion economy – and then go on to be a $15 trillion-plus economy over the next two decades. India will emerge as one of the largest global markets, both in terms of consumption size and market cap.”

“The largest middle class that will ever exist, augmented by an increase in the working age and consuming population share, will have a positive impact on India’s growth very much in line with the demographic dividend India enjoys.”

For Adani Group’s businesses, Adani informed that the “real phase of accelerated growth is just beginning.”

Market capitalisation

On the landmark of the six listed Adani Group entities achieving $100 billion in market capitalisation during the beginning of the new financial year 2021-22, Adani said, “This valuation milestone is a first for a first-generation Indian company.”

For the fiscal 2020-21, the consolidated EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization) for Group’s listed entities was over ₹32,000 crore — up 22 per cent year-on-year.

“All Adani stocks generated returns over 100 per cent – and our businesses ensured that we returned close to ₹9,500 crore to you, our equity shareholders. This is a 166 per cent increase in Profit After Tax on a year-on-year basis,” Adani said.

In order to boost the confidence of small investors, Adani stated that the group focused on “long term sustainable value for our partners, our minority investors and ourselves.”

The statement came after small investors suffered heavy losses following a rout of most of Adani Group counters on stock exchanges during June.

“Recently, a few media houses indulged in reckless and irresponsible reporting related to administrative actions of regulators. This caused unexpected fluctuations in the market prices of Adani stocks. Unfortunately, some of our small investors were affected by this twisted narrative in which some commentators and journalists seemed to imply that companies have regulatory powers over their shareholders and that companies can compel disclosure,” Adani said.

“In the long term, such diversions will not impact us,” he added.

Adani now operates in the businesses of seaports, airports, logistics, natural resources, thermal and renewable power generation, transmission, distribution, data centres, defence, agri and food, real estate, city gas utilities, and several others.

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