First time an Asian has entered the top three on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Adani has overtaken France’s Bernard Arnault and now trails just Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos of the US in the ranking.
Adani was able to move past some of the world’s richest US billionaires partly because they’ve recently boosted their philanthropy. Gates said in July he was transferring $20 billion to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, while Warren Buffett has already donated more than $35 billion to the charity.
Adani, too, has increased his charitable giving, pledging in June to donate $7.7 billion for social causes to mark his 60th birthday.
While all other billionaires in the top 10 have seen a decline in the net worth YTD, Adani’s fortune has gone up by $60.9 billion, five times more than anyone else.
The Adani Group is the third largest conglomerate in India, after Reliance Industries and the Tata Group. The group has its presence in areas such as ports, power, green energy, gas, airports, among others. The Adani Group now plans to foray into the telecom space after it bid for the 5G spectrum.