Gautam Adani becomes Asia’s richest person, surpasses Mukesh Ambani

New Delhi: Billionaire industrialist Gautam Adani, Chairman of the Adani Group, has become Asia’s richest individual, overtaking Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani, according to the latest Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Gautam Adani’s net worth rose to $92.6 billion, placing him 19th globally, while Mukesh Ambani slipped to the 20th position with a net worth of $90.8 billion.

The reshuffle at the top highlights the ongoing volatility in global wealth rankings in 2026, amid rising geopolitical tensions and market fluctuations.

In Thursday’s stock market session, Adani Group stocks witnessed a sharp rise, outperforming benchmark indices, which led to an increase of around $3.56 billion in Gautam Adani’s net worth in a single day.

Globally, Tesla CEO Elon Musk continues to top the list with a net worth of $656 billion, followed by Google co-founder Larry Page at $286 billion.

Other names in the top 10 include Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Oracle’s Larry Ellison, Dell Technologies’ Michael Dell, Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault, among others.

Notably, seven of the world’s top 20 richest individuals have recorded declines in their net worth so far in 2026.

Moreover, Arnault has seen the steepest drop, losing $44 billion during the period.

Other billionaires who have witnessed significant erosion in wealth include Steve Ballmer, Larry Ellison, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Amancio Ortega.

A sectoral analysis of the index shows that technology entrepreneurs continue to dominate the global rich list, while industrials, energy and retail billionaires have seen relatively higher volatility in their net worth.

Among other Indian billionaires, Lakshmi Mittal ranked 62nd globally with a net worth of $36.9 billion.

HCL founder Shiv Nadar stood at the 70th position with $33.5 billion, followed by Shapoor Mistry and family at 71st with $33.2 billion.

Savitri Jindal, chairperson emeritus of the OP Jindal Group, was ranked 73rd globally with a net worth of $32.7 billion.

Other prominent Indian names on the list include Sunil Mittal and family, Azim Premji, Kumar Mangalam Birla and Radhakishan Damani.

Meanwhile, Adani Group stocks such as Adani Total Gas, Adani Ports, and Adani Power climbed up to 3 per cent on Friday during the intra-day trading.

IANS