Mukesh Ambani, 54, leads Asians with a net worth of $26.8 billion, down $185.4 million in a day. His fortune is up 25 percent this year, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as his shares in India's top company by market value, Mumbai-based Reliance Industries Ltd., have risen 17 percent.
Hong Kong's Li Ka-shing, nicknamed "Superman" by the local media for his investing prowess, ranks second in the region, with $25.8 billion. Li, 83, owns large stakes in Hong Kong-based property developer Cheung Kong Holdings Ltd., Hong Kong shipping and ports operator Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. and Husky Energy Inc., the Calgary-based energy company.
Lakshmi Mittal, the India-born chairman of ArcelorMittal, the world's biggest steelmaker, is the third-richest Asian, with holdings valued at $23.6 billion. In addition to his ArcelorMittal stake, the 61-year-old London resident owns hundreds of millions of dollars in U.K. real estate.
On the rise: Gina Rinehart, the Australian mining heiress who is worth $20.4 billion. Rinehart, 58, the daughter of the man who discovered the mines that made Australia the world's biggest iron ore exporter, inherited perpetual royalty rights to some of Rio Tinto Ltd.'s Hamersley mines in addition to other thermal and iron-ore deposits throughout the country.
Soaring demand for coal and iron ore from China have made Rinehart's assets attractive to acquisitive industrial companies. In separate deals in the past year, steelmakers Posco and GVK Power & Infrastructure Ltd. agreed to pay a combined $2.9 billion for pieces of Rinehart's empire.