New Delhi: India’s promoters’ club has shrunk by 13.7% for the first time in three years, falling from 204 at the end of December 2024 to 176 in 2025, marking the steepest decline in both, the number of billionaire promoters and their aggregate wealth since 2012, Business Standard has reported.Meanwhile, both Reliance Industries chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani and Adani group’s founder Gautam Adani retained their first and second spots, recording an increase in their net worth.The billionaire club’s combined wealth recorded a 5% year-on-year decline to USD 984.2 billion at the end of December 2025 from USD 1,036.2 billion at the end of December 2024. The last such shrinkage in the billionaire club was in 2022, when its numbers fell to 126 against 142 in 2021. The fall has come amid a selloff in mid- and small-cap stocks that eroded market capitalisations, while the dollar-denominated wealth was reduced by the depreciated rupee, the report said. While the benchmark BSE Sensex was up 9%, gains remained uneven, benchmark BSE Midcap index, on the other hand, was barely in the green and the BSE Smallcap index was down 7% since the end of December 2024. During this period, the Indian rupee also depreciated, and fell from an average of 84.93 against the dollar in December 2024 to 90.03 in December 2025.The contraction in the billionaires club has come despite a boom in initial public offerings (IPOs). Nine new billionaires were created as 128 companies went public last year and were listed. The new billionaires included the four founders and promoters of Billionbrains Garage Ventures, who together hold $3.1 billion. Physicswallah, Anthem Bioscience, Meesho and Lenskart Solutions also minted billionaires.Ambani, however, retained the top spot among billionaires recording a 17.3% increase in net worth at USD 123.4 billion on December 29, 2025 against USD 105.2 billion at the end of December 2024. Adani, who also retained his second spot, recorded an increase of 2.3% in his net worth rising from USD 100.5 billion in December 2024 to USD 102.8 billion in December 2025.Bharti Airtel’s Sunil Bharti Mittal moved from the sixth place to the third spot, recording a 15.6% increase in net worth from USD 26.4 billion at the end of 2024 to USD 30.6 billion in 2025.Asian Paints promoters Malav Dani, Amrita Vakil and Manish Choksi also recorded an increase in net worth by 14.7% bringing them to the 10th spot against 13th place the year before.JSW group’s Sajjan Jindal saw his net worth slip by 3.8% but rose to the sixth place from the seventh spot.Others who lost ranks included HCL Technologies’ Shiv Nadar, Wipro’s Azim Premji, and Sun Pharmaceutical Industries’ Dilip Shanghavi, but remained in the top 10. Nadar, who was at third spot in 2024, fell to the fourth spot, recording a decline in net worth of 19.8% to USD 29.8 billion against USD 37.3 billion in 2024. Shanghavi’s wealth recorded a decline of 14.4% to USD 25.3 billion, and Premji’s net worth declined by 17.5% to USD 22.4 billion. On the other hand, Avenue Supermarts promoter Radhakrishnan Damani and Bajaj group’s Sanjiv and Rajiv Bajaj remained at their respective positions of 8th and 9th place.