Gautam Adani has reclaimed his position as Asia’s richest person after shares across his Indian conglomerate soared on Friday, adding nearly $2.5 billion to his personal fortune in a single trading session and pushing his total net worth to $89.2 billion, according to Forbes.
The surge lifted Adani ahead of fellow Indian industrialist Mukesh Ambani, whose wealth stands at $88 billion, and Japanese technology investor Masayoshi Son — chief of SoftBank Group — whose fortune slipped to $87 billion amid a sharp retreat in Japanese equity markets.
The day’s sharpest gains were recorded by Adani Green Energy, the conglomerate’s clean power subsidiary, whose shares climbed 6.9 per cent. Listed entities spanning transmission, ports, flagship holdings and conventional power generation also posted significant advances. Combined, the group’s six publicly traded companies now carry a market capitalisation of roughly $191 billion.
Analysts have linked the broader revival in Adani’s fortunes to a landmark legal development last month, when the United States Department of Justice dropped a major fraud case against the billionaire. His net worth has risen by an estimated $10 billion since that dismissal.
The charges, filed in November last year, alleged that Adani and associates paid $250 million in bribes to Indian government officials in exchange for solar power supply contracts, subsequently concealing those payments whilst soliciting capital from international investors. Adani and his co-accused denied the allegations throughout the proceedings.
The resurgence carries direct relevance for Bangladesh. Adani Power — the conglomerate’s generation arm — supplies close to 1,500 megawatts of electricity to the country, drawn from a 1,600-megawatt coal-fired facility in Jharkhand, eastern India, which has long served as a critical source of cross-border power.
