Gautam Adani is now the third richest person in the world, behind only Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos

• Gautam Adani’s total net worth was $137 billion, making him the third richest person in the world.
• Adani has added $61 billion to his net worth since the beginning of 2022, making him the biggest winner this year by a huge margin.
• The gap between Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani – India’s two richest people – has also widened to $45 billion.

Gautam Adani, the richest person in Asia, is now the third richest person in the world, behind only Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. Adani first achieved this feat by beating French business magnate Bernard Arnault, the co-founder of the luxury brand Louis Vuitton.

According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Gautam Adani’s net worth was $137 billion, which is closer to Jeff Bezos whose net worth is $153 billion. However, Adani is still $114 billion from Elon Musk, whose net worth is $251 billion.

Adani is also the biggest winner in 2022, adding $61 billion to his net worth. In comparison, Musk lost $19 billion while Bezos lost $39 billion, while Mukesh Ambani added $2 billion over the same period.

The gap between Adani and Ambani is widening. After several months of fighting head-to-head, Adani outran Ambani, whose wealth is $92 billion.

After the recent drop in Reliance Industries’ market capitalization, Ambani is now also not in the top 10 billionaires.

Despite “deeply overloaded” concerns

Just last week, a CreditSights report warned of the group’s sizable debt, leading to a massive ₹94,000 crore drop in the group’s seven listed stocks.

The report argues that the group’s chosen path of inorganic growth through acquisitions is too ambitious and could lead to a ‘massive debt trap’. In the worst cases, it could lead to the default of one or two companies in the group, the report predicted.

The Adani group recently received approval for an open offer for two cement companies it acquired in May for $10.5 billion. It also acquired the Israeli port of Haifa for $1.18 billion.

The equity injections into the group are rare, but “they pale in comparison to the total investment needs of the entity involved,” the report says. The agency said it takes no solace in the personal wealth the group chairman possesses.

Adani has increased his net worth by almost 23x since the first Covid lockdown

To understand Adani’s climb to the top, it is essential to know where he was two years ago.

According to Bloomberg data, Adani’s total wealth was $6 billion on the day India entered a nationwide lockdown due to the Covid pandemic.

Since then, Adani has increased his net worth almost 23 times. If you had invested ₹1 lakh in Adani on March 24, 2020, your investment would be worth ₹23 lakh today.

In comparison, Mukesh Ambani’s net worth was $32.6 billion in March 2020. It has now risen to $92 billion, growing just 3x.

Here are the seven publicly traded companies of the Adani Group:

Source: NSE, as on August 29, 2022

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