Jeff Bezos loses spot as second-richest person

Gautam Adani, 60, is the first Asian busines person to rank in the top three of the global wealth index, which is typically dominated by US tech entrepreneurs

Indian billionaire Gautam Adani is now the world’s second-richest person, dethroning Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in the title he was demoted to last year after Elon Musk overtook him as the wealthiest person in the world.

The 60-year-old Indian chairman of the Adani Group, which includes businesses in coal production, infrastructure and thermal power generation, has a real-time net worth of $155.5bn, according to the Forbes Real Time Billionaire’s List.

Along with becoming one of the first Asian businesspeople to rank among the top three billionaires globally, the Indian tycoon’s company impressively climbed the ranks this year at a breakneck speed having only started the year at No 14 on the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index.

He is also reported to have the country’s largest private port operator with plans to expand their growing airport operations, Quartz India reported.

The scales were tipped in Mr Adani’s favour after shares of his Adani Enterprises Ltd increased to a record this week, while some of his companies have increased by more than 1,000 per cent since 2020, Bloomberg reported.

Indian billionaire Gautam Adani. (REUTERS)

The gap now between Mr Adani and the richest person on the planet, Mr Musk, stands at more than $100bn, as the Tesla founder and tech titan is said to have a net worth of $260bn, Bloomberg reported.

For Mr Bezos, the climb to return to his longheld title as richest person is proving to be a much harder gap to close in on as he saw his net worth drop to $145.8bn on Friday morning in New York after a renewed tech selloff.

The titles for the second richest person could once again be awarded to the American billionaire, as his net worth is largely tied to shares of Amazon.com Inc, which have fallen more than 26 per cent this year.

Mr Adani’s climb to the top of the world rankings began in February of this year, when he was reported to be the richest person in Asia, taking the title previously held by India’s Mukesh Ambani.

He then joined a small elite club of entrepreneurs in April whose net worth is classified as a centibillionaire, and then went onto outpace Microsoft founder Bill Gates and France’s Bernard Arnault over the summer.