Photo: PexelsIn real-time rankings from Forbes, Musk slipped into second place, following his big cash outlay for the social media company and the subsequent drop in Tesla’s stock price.
Close on his heels and seemingly poised to take the bragging rights for world’s richest person in the near term is Bernard Arnault, the chief executive of Louis Vuitton's parent company LVMH, with an estimated $185.7 billion.
Close on his heels and seemingly poised to take the bragging rights for world’s richest person in the near term is Bernard Arnault, the chief executive of Louis Vuitton's parent company LVMH, with an estimated $185.7 billion. Arnault added a few hundred million dollars to his fortune Wednesday morning, as shares of his luxury conglomerate inched upward. But with LVMH’s stock flat this year, Arnault owes his renewed status as the world’s richest person mainly to the dramatic collapse of Tesla’s share price. That pushed down the Tesla CEO’s net worth, which peaked at $320 billion in November 2021, after car rental giant Hertz announced a large order from the electric vehicle maker, writes forbes.com.
Musk has held the title of world’s richest person with Forbes since September 2021, displacing Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. But 2022 saw him laying out big portions of that wealth to purchase Twitter, which was (in part) a catalyst for Tesla’s volatility, which brought his number even lower.
The Forbes ranking is just one estimation of wealth, of course. Bloomberg maintains its own list of the world’s billionaires, and its calculations shows Musk with a $14 billion lead over Arnault as of Dec. 6. (Bloomberg does not update its numbers in real time.)
Tesla’s loss of more than 47% of its value since the outspoken entrepreneur bought Twitter has impacted his bottom line. Earlier this year, according to Forbes, he was worth more than $270 billion. As of Nov. 22, he had lost $100 billion in net worth this year alone, reports fortune.com.
Source: fortune.com, forbes.com
