Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani, two rivals in India’s business sector, are at a turning point now. If all eyes were on Ambani before the pandemic, now, the centre of attention is Gautam Adani. The world’s sixth-richest person, Adani has added almost $30 billion to his wealth this year. It is $10 billion more than Ambani’s.
Although both want to lead India’s market, looks like investors favour Adani more. It is because he is the bolder of the two.
In the last year, Adani spent $17 billion on 32 acquisitions. Although the combined net debt across his listed companies stands at almost $20 billion, he is not showing any signs of slowing down. However, Ambani’s net-debt-to-Ebitda stands at a comfortable 0.7 this financial year, thanks to the price jump in India’s telecoms market and natural gas. Both are Ambani’s forte.
When it comes to the identity of ‘the man who made India’, Adani has got the leverage as he goes in tune with the govt of India’s Atmanirbhar concept. Compared to Ambani, who is diversifying into a consumer-oriented business, Adani sticks mostly to infrastructure by acquiring ports and airports. That seems to be useful to New Delhi to generate fiscal resources by monetizing public assets. It is also a good foreign policy tool. For instance, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa awarded a 51% stake in a new western Colombo port terminal to Adani to make up for annoying its neighbour with a pro-China tilt.
Moreover, Adani’s association with Modi goes back to the latter’s Gujarat days as the Chief Minister. At a time when he was attacked for the deadly Hindu-Musli riots, Modi got the support of first-generation Gujarati entrepreneur Adani.
Now, Adani controls 24 per cent of India’s port capacity, just like he reigns the airports. And, the stock market is in favour of Adani’s expansion into infrastructure and other areas such as coal mining, city gas, power generation and distribution, edible oil refining and cement.
Now, we have to wait and watch how their ideas are going to support them in future.
