Kudos to Mukesh Ambani for reaching into worlds top 10 richest people’s list

Reliance Industries Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani has became the first Indian to enter the global top 10 richest billionaire list complied by Hurun Research. According to the Hurun Global Rich List 2019 released on Tuesday, Ambani broke into the top 10 in the world for the first time after a $9 billion or 20 per cent surge in his wealth to $54 billion. “The only Asian in the Top 10, Ambani’s wealth is based on telecom, retail and energy, and bucked the poor stock market trend in India last year,” Hurun Research said in a statement.

The list comes aligned with the time when Mukesh Ambani’s brother Anil Ambani is held in contempt of court by the Supreme Court for non-payment of Rs 540 crore to Ericsson. Both the siblings had started off more or less with almost same inherited wealth after the family split. But Mukesh added USD 30 billion to his wealth in the past seven years, while Anil has lost over USD 5 billion during the same period. The biggest blow for Anil Ambani, the once-sixth richest in world went down by over $5 billion from $7 billion seven years ago to $1.9 billion this year.

This might not be bad news just for Anil Ambani as the Hurun report suggests that, the number of individuals featured in the 2019 edition has come down by 224 to 2,470 from 2,694 in 2018. Also, Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who had been on the top since 10 years has been pushed down to the second position with a wealth of $96 billion – followed by Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. ($88 billion) on third, LVMH’s Bernard Arnault ($86 billion) at fourth and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg ($80 billion) on fifth this year.