Mukesh Ambani, Premji, Kotak, Mittal's wealth hit by market crash; but Damani is still smiling

The nearly $19 billion fall in net worth for Mukesh Ambani was the fifth worst globally.

By Amit Mudgill, ETMarkets.com | Updated: Mar 14, 2020, 12.15 PM IST

Damani, the owner of supermarket chain D-Mart, was worth $10.1 billion, as of Friday, with his wealth up $416 million year to date.

Ace investor Radhakishan Damani is the only Indian billionaire on the Bloomberg Billionaire Index, who is still in positive in terms of wealth growth for this calendar despite the market meltdown.

This, even as Mukesh Ambani, the richest Indian, has become the fifth biggest loser in net worth globally.

Damani, the owner of supermarket chain D-Mart, was worth $10.1 billion, as of Friday, with his wealth up $416 million year to date.

Mukesh Ambani, on the other hand, has seen nearly 32 per cent wealth erosion amid a free fall in crude oil prices and the mayhem in the stock market. His oil-to-telecom behemoth, RIL’s worth stood at $40 billion as of Friday, down by $18.6 billion for the calendar.

The nearly $19 billion fall in net worth for Ambani was the fifth worst globally behind similar losses suffered by global billionaires Bernard Arnault (down $36.9 billion), Amancio Ortega (down $23.4 billion), Warren Buffett (down $19.1 billion) and Mark Zuckerberg ($18.9 billion).

Other Indian billionaires such as Wipro’s Azim Premji (down $3.23 billion to $15.1 billion), HCL Tech’s Shiv Nadar (down $2.27 billion to $13.5 billion), Kotak Mahindra bank’s Uday Kotak (down $2.41 to $12.4 billion and Lakshmi Mittal (down $4.53 billion to $8.64 billion) have all seen significant wealth erosion in this stock crash.

For the ongoing calendar, shares of Mukesh Ambani’s flagship Reliance Industries have tumbled 30.87 per cent, IT stock Wipro has dropped 22 per cent while HCL Tech has declined 13 per cent. Kotak Mahindra Bank has slid 12.83 per cent.

But Damani’s D-Mart is still up 8.64 per cent year-to-date.

Concerns over coronavirus spread has spooked investors the world over. The meltdown has wiped out Rs 46 lakh crore off domestic equities since January 20.

Total market capitalisation of BSE-listed firms tanked to Rs 113.49 lakh crore as of Friday from Rs 159.28 lakh crore 38 sessions ago, when the benchmark equity indices scaled their all-time highs.

Stock investors, here's what to do now

1/4

Equities can move up eventually, driven by the current Supernova of liquidity. GDP growth is likely to remain weak for some time. Two historical templates can be looked at: 1) 2017 - market up-move accompanied by improving GDP growth. Stocks with higher leverage outperformed 2) 2019 - equities up without GDP acceleration. Stocks with high leverage lagged. Any equity rebound now will look more like 2019, in our view - a weak economy drives topline concerns, in which case leverage will still be bad.