In yet another big milestone for Adani Group of Industries founder Gautam Adani, he has become the world’s third-richest person as per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Elon Musk retained the top spot with his net-worth touching $251.4 billion, followed by Jeff Bezos ($153.4 Billion) and Mr. Adani at $137.4 billion. This is the first time an Asian person has broken into the top three as Mr. Adani overtook France’s Bernard Arnault.
Mr. Adani added $60.9 billion to his fortune in 2022 alone, five times more than anyone else. He first overtook Mukesh Ambani as the richest Asian in February, and then surpassed Microsoft Corp.’s Bill Gates as the world’s fourth-richest person last month.
Mr. Adani (60) has been expanding his coal-to-ports conglomerate to avenues like data centers, cement, media and alumina in the past few years, as per a Bloomberg report. The Adani group now owns India’s largest private-sector port and airport operator, city-gas distributor and coal miner. Moreover, Mr. Adani has pledged in November to invest $70 billion in green energy to become the world’s largest renewable-energy producer, the report said.
The report also cited CreditSights as saying this month that the Adani Group’s growth has been predominantly funded with debt and his empire is “deeply over-leveraged.” “Some lawmakers and market watchers have also raised concerns over opaque shareholder structures and a lack of analyst coverage at Adani Group companies,” it said.
Mr. Adani’s recent ascent to the top three is partly because of greater philanthropy among the top billionaires. Mr. Gates said in July that he was transferring $20 billion to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, while Warren Buffett has already donated more than $35 billion to charity. On his part, Mr. Adani too pledged in June to donate $7.7 billion for social causes to mark his 60th birthday.
