Indian Billionaire Topples Jack Ma To Become Asia’s Richest Man

An Indian man has outranked Alibaba founder Jack Ma to become Asia’s richest person.

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani climbed the top of Bloomberg Billionaires Index on Friday with his $44.3 billion, which surpasses Ma’s $44-billion.

Ambani’s wealth reportedly grew by $4 billion after shares of his company recently increased by 1.8 % to a record-high of Rs 1,106 ($6.16), Bloomberg reports.

Reliance also became the second company, after TCS, to enter the $100-billion valuation club on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

While Alibaba remains Asia’s most valuable firm with a market cap of nearly $487 billion, its shares have dropped by over 10% on the New York Stock Exchange in a month, causing Ma to lose almost $1.4 billion this year.

Reliance’s recent surge was reportedly brought about by its growing telecom and media brand Jio, which has generated some favorable market sentiment.

Last week, the 61-year-old billionaire announced plans to integrate Reliance’s consumer businesses with telecom and media shortly after offering free phone calls and cheap data via Jio.

Featured image via Wikimedia Commons/Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

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