Chennai, Mar 22 (IANS): Despite an erosion of 20 per cent or $21 billion in wealth, Reliance Industries' Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani continues to be at the top 10 wealthiest individuals in the world with a wealth of $82 billion, states the 2023 M3M Hurun Global Rich List.

For the third consecutive year, Ambani retained the wealthiest Asian title.

With a 35 per cent decrease or $28 billion in wealth to $53 billion, Gautam Adani & family, of Adani Group slipped to 23rd rank in the world's wealthiest from the last year's second rank.

Adani also lost the second richest Asian title in 2023.

A report in January by US short-seller Hindenburg led to Adani seeing his wealth down by more than 60 per cent from his peak.

Last year, it was said that Adani topped the list by adding Rs 1,600 crore per day over 2022.

The other Indian billionaires who figure in the world's top 50 richest are: Cyrus Poonawalla (global rank 46, wealth $27 billion), and Shiv Nadar and family (rank 50, $26 billion).

Interestingly, barring Poonawalla whose wealth went up by 4 per cent, the wealth of all other Indian billionaires in the global top 100 wealthiest had seen an erosion.

In stark contrast to the 2022 M3M Hurun Global Rich List, India is at the top of the league table when it comes to wealth depletion.

When countries such as China and the US had 178 and 123 billionaires, respectively, who lost more than $1 billion, India has 41 billionaires who lost more than a billion-dollar YoY in 2023 M3M Hurun Global Rich List.

In terms of number of billionaires who have added $1 billion or more over the last year, India occupies sixth rank in the list.

India added 16 billionaires and occupies the third spot, comfortably ahead of Italy which added 9 billionaires in this year's list.

The richest new entrant from India, Rekha Rakesh Jhunjhunwala & family, tops the list of top 16 new Indian entrants in 2023 M3M Hurun Global Rich List.

Over the last 5 years, Indian billionaires in 2023 M3M Hurun Global Rich List added circa $360 billion to their cumulative wealth - equivalent to Hong Kong's GDP.

"M3M Hurun Global Rich List 2023 tells the story of the current global economy through the eyes of the entrepreneurs," said Anas Rahman Junaid, MD and Chief Researcher, Hurun India.

"At a critical point in history, when India's GDP is poised to double by the end of the decade, we are excited about celebrating and benchmarking wealth creation in India with the rest of the world," said Pankaj Bansal, Director, M3M India.