Indian billionaire Gautam Adani is now the world’s second-richest person, dethroning Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in the title he was demoted to a year ago after Elon Musk overtook him as the wealthiest person in the world.
According to the Forbes Real Time Billionaire’s List, the Indian chairman of the Adani Group, who is 60 years old, has a real-time net worth of $155.5bn. The Adani Group is made up of companies that make coal, build infrastructure, and make thermal power.
Along with being one of the first Asian businessmen to rank among the top three billionaires worldwide, the Indian tycoon’s firm impressively ascended the rankings this year at a rapid pace, having just begun the year at No. 14 on the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index.
Quartz India said that he also owns the largest private port operator in the country and wants to expand the successful airport operations he already has.
Bloomberg said that Mr. Adani’s enterprises have seen price increases of over 1,000% since 2020 and that this week alone saw a record surge in Adani Enterprises Ltd. shares.
According to Bloomberg, the difference in net worth between Mr. Adani and Mr. Musk, the inventor of Tesla and a tech titan, is more than $100 billion at the current time. Mr. Musk is estimated to have a net worth of $260 billion.
Mr. Bezos’ net worth fell to $145.8 billion on Friday morning in New York as a result of a renewed tech selloff, making it much more difficult for him to reclaim his long-held position as the world’s wealthiest person.
Because a significant portion of the American billionaire’s wealth is related to shares of Amazon.com Inc., which have dropped by more than 26 percent so far in 2018, it is possible that he may once again be ranked as the world’s second wealthiest person.
Mr. Adani’s rise to the top of the global rankings began in February of this year, when it was announced that he had become the richest person in Asia, overtaking Mukesh Ambani of India, who had held that title for twenty years.
The following month, in April, he became a member of a select group of business owners whose combined wealth is so great that it is measured in the hundreds of billions of dollars. By the following summer, he had surpassed the wealth of Microsoft’s founder, Bill Gates, as well as that of Bernard Arnault of France.
