[1,2]-Rearrangement of iminium salts provides access to heterocycles with adamantane scaffold.

We describe a Brønsted acid-catalysed cascade reaction consisting of a Wagner-Meerwein rearrangement and a subsequent intra- or intermolecular Friedel-Crafts reaction leading to adamantane-based heterocycles. In contrast to the reported W.-M. rearrangements, in this case an iminium moiety serves as the acceptor of a migrating nucleophilic alkyl group in a [1,2]-alkyl shift.