Company controlled by Asia’s richest person loses $51 billion in value in one week

The Adani Group, controlled by Asia’s richest person, Gautam Adani, lost more than $51 billion in value this week after a short seller accused the company of engaging in a “brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme.”

The company’s stocks began plummeting on Tuesday following the release of the report from Hindenburg Research and it had lost more than $51 billion in market value as of Friday, according to Bloomberg News.

Jugeshinder Singh, the chief financial officer of the Adani Group, dismissed the report on Wednesday as a “malicious combination of selective misinformation and stale, baseless and discredited allegations that have been tested and rejected by India’s highest courts.”

The head of Adani’s legal team, Jatin Jalundhwala, added in a statement on Thursday that the company is considering “remedial and punitive action” against Hindenburg Research.

Hindenburg responded, claiming that the Adani Group has not addressed “a single substantive issue” raised in the report and encouraged the company to file suit in the U.S.

“We fully stand by our report and believe any legal action taken against us would be meritless,” it said in a statement.

Adani was the seventh richest person in the world as of Friday, with a net worth of $92.7 billion, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index. Earlier in the week, he was ranked third on the list.