-Gautam Adani’s wealth surged to make him the second richest man in the world, led by a sharp rally in the Adani Group stocks.
-An announcement on Karan’s appointment could come as soon as Friday, the people said. A representative for Adani Group declined to comment.
New Delhi, NFAPost: Adani Group’s chairperson and Indian billionaire Gautam Adani surpassed Amazon’s Jeff Bezos to become the world’s second richest person. He is now only behind Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who remains the world’s richest man with a networth of $273.5 billion, according to Forbes’ real time data, LiveMint reported.
Adani’s wealth surged to make him the second richest man in the world, led by a sharp rally in the Adani Group stocks. According to the Forbes real-time billionaires list, Adani’s net worth stood at $155.7 billion as of September 16, 2022, up $5.5 billion or nearly 4%.
As the Adani Group stocks of Adani Enterprises, Adani Port and Adani Transmission hit their record highs on the BSE in Friday’s early deals, Gautam Adani’s real time net worth reflected the stock market surge.
The Adani Group chairman has added more than $70 billion to his fortune in 2022 (YTD). In February, he overtook Mukesh Ambani as the richest Asian, became a centibillionaire in April and left behind Microsoft’s Bill Gates as the world’s fourth-richest person last month.
The Ahmedabad-based infrastructure group is the largest port operator in India. The group also owns India’s largest closely held thermal coal producer and largest coal trader. Adani Enterprises reported revenue of $5.3 billion in the year to March 31, 2021.
Gautam Adani wants to be the world’s largest producer of green energy and earlier said that he would invest upto $70 billion on renewable energy projects.
Currently, he is a 75% stakeowner in Adani Enterprises, Adani Power and Adani Transmissions, according to March 2022 stock exchange filings. He also owns 37% of Adani Total Gas, 65% of Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone and 61% of Adani Green Energy.
Reliance Industries Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani is at eighth place with a net worth of $92.3 billion.
Adani’s elder son to oversee newly acquired cement companies
Karan Adani, the elder son of world’s third-richest man Gautam Adani, is set to oversee the family’s scaled up cement business, according to people familiar with the matter, as the rapidly expanding conglomerate seeks to integrate the two cement companies it acquired for $10.5 billion in May.
Besides bringing in his son, the Indian billionaire is also planning to enlist key senior executives to help grow the cement business and mentor Karan, according to the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is private.
Karan, 35, is currently the chief executive officer of Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd. He’s expected to find synergies between the group’s ports and cements businesses in order to create an integrated logistics firm, the people said.
An announcement on Karan’s appointment could come as soon as Friday, the people said. A representative for Adani Group declined to comment.
Gautam Adani has surged to prominence this year, as an eye-catching leap in his fortune made him one of the richest people on the planet in a matter of months, leapfrogging compatriot Mukesh Ambani and titans like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. He’s now gaining on world No. 2 Jeff Bezos.
A combination of soaring coal prices and skyrocketing equity gains fueled the wealth surge, which has enabled his Adani Group to supercharge its ambitions, rapidly diversifying beyond its commodity and fossil-fuel roots into airports, media, digital services and telecommunications. The tycoon is also making a $70 billion bet on green energy, a shift that’s been criticized as an attempt to greenwash the group’s coal focus.
Adani’s biggest spend this year has, however, been on cement, with the billionaire creating India’s second-largest cement producer by buying Ambuja Cements Ltd. and ACC Ltd. from Switzerland’s Holcim Ltd. in May.
Agencies
