OCTOBER 6, 2021 – Viceroy Research is short Adler Group SA (ETR : ADJ) and its listed subsidiaries. The Adler Group is a hotbed of fraud, deception and financial misrepresentation designed to hide its true financial position, which is bleak. The Adler Group exists as a conduit for its shadow directors and associates to systematically enrich themselves to the detriment of bondholders, shareholders, and minority holders of various listed investments.
Adler Group’s modus operandi is to acquire or force mergers with better capitalized companies to then saddle them with debt. Management then channels cash and assets to enrich its friends and associates via undisclosed and blatantly uncommercial related-party transactions, many of which are never intended to be settled in full.
Its balance sheet has been artificially inflated to a significant degree, its shares are not investible, and its bonds are almost certain to default with very large impairments.
The business practices at Adler and amongst its kleptocratic network are not simply sharp dealing, they amount to gross dishonesty and fraud, and the roll-up nature of the company makes any financial analysis time-consuming and difficult.
There are significant regulatory issues at play, and we expect authorities may soon act.
For these reasons we refuse to assign a target price to Adler’s shares and believe they are un-investable.