Gautam Adani pips Bill Gates to become world's 4th richest man

Business magnate Gautam Adani has overtaken Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates to become the fourth-richest person on the planet.

This comes nearly three months after the Adani Group chairman tied with Gates as the world's fourth-richest person in April this year.

The Gujarat-based tycoon's net worth jumped $36 billion this year, making him the biggest gainer year-to-date, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Adani's fortunes stood at $113 billion as of July 22, 2022 – $1 billion more than the net worth of Gates.

The steep rise in Adani's fortunes this year has already made him richer than Google co-founder Larry Page and billionaire investor Warren Buffet.

Out of the top ten richest people in the world, only Adani has seen his net worth increase in 2022 so far.

The chairman of the ports-to-power conglomerate had entered the centibillionaires club — businessmen having a fortune of $100 billion or more — in April.

Adani, the richest person in Asia, is the only billionaire to figure in the $100 billion club from the continent.

Net worth of Mukesh Ambani, India's second richest person, has dropped around $2 billion in 2022 to $88 billion as of July 22. This makes Ambani the world's 11th richest person.

Adani initially made his fortune in the coal industry. He started out as a trader and then went on to build India's largest thermal power capacity in the private sector.

When the government decided to dump fossil fuels to promote renewable energy, Adani quickly joined the green energy bandwagon. His conglomerate is now on its way to becoming the largest solar power producer in the world.

The Adani Group plans to spend 75% capital expenditure in green businesses, including $20 billion in renewable, green component manufacturing and enabling infrastructure, over the next decade.

Meanwhile, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates last week said he will donate $20 billion to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as the non-profit looks to increase spending from nearly $6 billion per year before Covid-19 to $9 billion per year by 2026.

"I will move down and eventually off of the list of the world's richest people," Gates said in a blog post, adding that the great crises of our time require all of us to do more. "My plan is to give all my wealth to the foundation other than what I spend on myself and my family," he said.

Appreciating the donations made to the Gates Foundation by Berkshire Hathaway founder Warren Buffett, the Microsoft cofounder said although it is named the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, basically half of the resources to date have come from Buffett’s gifts.

"Since 2006, Warren has gifted the foundation $35.7 billion, including his most recent gift of $3.1 billion in June. The actual value of these gifts is about $45 billion if you include the appreciation of the Berkshire Hathaway stock after it was given. Warren's advice and thinking influenced the foundation in a profound way even before he made any gifts," Gates wrote in the blog post.