
Bavaguthu Raghuram Shetty the founder and Chairman of NMC Healthcare, UAE Exchange as well as Neopharma, Finablr and BRS Ventures/Bloomberg
by BloombergThe billionaire clan behind financial services firm Finablr and hospital operator NMC Health has seen its fortune drop more than $1.5 billion since it came under fire in December 2019 from short-seller Carson Block.
The latest blow came after a filing revealed the Shettys pledged more than half their stake in Finablr to secure loans. The payment processor’s shares tumbled as much as 34 per cent in London.
The family’s troubles began in December 2019 when Block’s Muddy Waters Capital issued a report criticising NMC’s accounts and disclosing a short position, sending shares down. Since then, a cyberattack rocked one of Finablr’s popular brands—Travelex Holdings—and NMC plunged again after investors sold shares worth almost $500 million.
The health-care firm has named former FBI Director Louis Freeh to examine Block’s claims.
Bavaguthu Raghuram Shetty founded NMC in 1975 after moving to Abu Dhabi from his native India. NMC Health now the UAE’s biggest private health-care provider.
Additionally, Shetty founded Finablr in 2018 to consolidate his finance brands and listed the company on the London Stock Exchange last year.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the family’s stakes in both firms were worth almost $3 billion before Muddy Waters published its report, but they have been cut in half since.
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