By Venkatachari Jagannathan
Chennai, Jan 30 (IANS): Life insurance giant Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) on Monday said it has invested in Adani Group's debt securities which were rated AA and above by credit rating agencies.
In a regulatory filing, the LIC said the credit rating of all of the Adani debt securities held by LIC are 'AA' and above which is in compliance with the IRDAI investment regulations as applicable to all life insurance companies.
Shares of Adani group's listed entities came down after short seller Hindenburg Research came out with a report alleging fraud by the Indian conglomerate.
Earlier, the State Bank of India (SBI) came out with a statement saying that its exposure to Adani group is well below the large exposure framework.
However, it was LIC which said the credit rating of all of the Adani debt securities held by it are 'AA' and above.
Reached out for comments on their rating of Adani group entities, Acuite Ratings & Research's Chief Analytical Officer Suman Chowdhury told IANS: "As a credit rating agency, Acuite Ratings & Research keeps all its outstanding ratings under continuous surveillance and evaluates the impact of any economic, industry or company specific event on the credit profile of a rated entity through a process of 'Material Event Review (MER)'."
"MER is an integral part of our internal rating processes which involves scanning the public domain for any related news on the rated entity, the subsequent impact analysis by the analytical team, and taking rating action, if warranted through a discussion in the Rating Committee. Such rating actions are also disseminated in the public domain in a timely manner," he added.
On Hindenburg Research report, Chowdhury said the rating agency is not in a position to discuss the specifics of a third-party research report on the Adani Group.
"However, we do have a rating outstanding on Adani Enterprises Ltd (AEL) where a material event review has been conducted recently and the rating rationale released in the public domain," Chowdhury said.
On January 27, Acuite Ratings had reaffirmed its A1+ credit rating of AEL's Rs 2,000 crore Commercial Paper.
CARE Ratings declined to answer the list of questions mailed by IANS.
On the other hand, CRISIL has not acknowledged the receipt of the questions mailed by IANS.