Speculators who reckoned what goes down must go up have made a tidy profit from a rise in Adani Group shares following their collapse in the wake of the scathing Hindenburg report.

There’s been a huge jump in the number of the group’s shares traded daily after the Hindenburg report sent the prices of the stocks tumbling between 30 per cent and 80 per cent.

The report by the US-based hedge fund accused the group of accounting fraud and share price manipulation—charges rejected as “baseless" by Adani chairman Gautam Adani

Over 17 million Adani Enterprises stocks were traded daily between January 24 and March 10, Businessline newspaper reported. By contrast, only 1.7 million shares were traded daily in the 21 days from January 2 to January 23.

The Adani group shares have presented a golden opportunity for speculators. Adani Enterprises, the group flagship, hit a peak of Rs 4,165 on December 20 and then tumbled to a low of Rs 1,193 on February 27. Since then, the stock has done a smart turnaround, climbing sharply to Rs 1,894 on March 10, as investors have piled in.

Similarly, Adani Ports and SEZ hit a peak of Rs 970 last September and then crashed to Rs 462 on February 2. It whipsawed back to Rs 699 on March 10. About 3.5 million Adani Ports shares were traded daily between January 2 and January 23. In sharp contrast, 29 million shares have been traded daily between January 24 and March 10.

Another Adani stock that has become a favourite with buyers is Adani Power which hit a lifetime high of Rs 432 last August and then crashed to a low of Rs 139 soon after the Hindenburg report came out. In January before the report appeared 2 million stocks were traded daily and that has climbed to 16 million traded daily between January 24 and March 10.

The suspicion that speculators are trading heavily in the Adani stocks was triggered by the fact that a smaller percentage of traders are taking delivery of the stocks they are buying. Instead of holding them, they are reselling them quickly. In the period between January 2 and January 23 about 20 per cent of people who bought Adani Enterprises stocks were taking delivery. That fell to 17 per cent between February 24 and March 10, says Businessline.

Similarly, 27 per cent of Adani Ports buyers were taking delivery between January 2 and January 23. That fell to 21 per cent in the weeks between January 24 and March 10.

For some Adani group companies on which circuit breakers have been applied the number of shares delivered has gone up sharply. So in January buyers took delivery of 29 per cent of Adani Total Gas shares. In the period between January 24 and March 10 they took delivery of 69 per cent of shares. A 5 per cent circuit breaker was placed on the stock for much of February. Altogether 10 Adani group stocks are listed including Ambuja Cements, ACC and NDTV which have recently become part of the group.

At a peak Gautam Adani was reckoned to be worth $147 billion. On Sunday the Forbes Real-Time Billionaire list estimated he was worth $47 billion. He had fallen to $39 billion a few days ago according to Forbes.

Since the bombshell Hindenburg report, the group has been active in pre-paying loans in a bid to reassure investors that the company has its financial house in order.