• Thursday, March 28, 2024

Business

Amazon dispute: Indian probe agency seeks Future papers

Representational Image: iStock

By: Shubham Ghosh

INDIA’S Enforcement Directorate (ED), which fights financial crime, has asked Future Group to submit documents in connection to its 2019 deal with Amazon as part of a probe into a possible breach of foreign investment laws, Reuters reported citing sources and a notice.

The demand indicates more scrutiny of a deal which is at the centre of legal tussles between Amazon and Future after the Indian company decided to sell its retail assets to rival Reliance Industries for $3.4 billion (£2.5 billion) in 2020.

The transaction was put on hold by an arbitrator and Indian courts after Amazon accused Future of violating its contracts with the US e-commerce giant by entering into the sale. Future denied the allegations and counter-accused Amazon of illegally interfering into its business moves.

In a confidential notice in October, the ED asked a Future unit to submit all correspondence, including emails between Amazon and Future in respect of the investment the American firm made in Future two years ago, Reuters, which reviewed a copy of the notice, added.

Reuters also cited two informed sources as saying that the notice was part of an ongoing probe by the Indian probe agency to establish whether there was any breach of the foreign investment law when Amazon made an investment worth $200 million (£148 million) in Future’s gift-voucher unit – Future Coupons.

The notice was sent to Future Coupons, which was given 15 days to respond, the report added.

The dispute centres around three commercial agreements signed between Future and Amazon in 2019, which an arbitration panel in Singapore, which is also hearing the dispute, said must be read together while reviewing the transaction and not separately as Future argues.

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