Allison Levitsky, Tech Industry Reporter – Silicon Valley Business Journal
Photo by Cromwell Schubarth
Elon Musk is now the world’s richest person, surpassing Amazon.com Inc. CEO Jeff Bezos.
A boost to Tesla Inc.’s (Nasdaq: TSLA) share price sent the company’s market cap past Facebook Inc.’s (Nasdaq: FB) on Thursday — and made CEO Elon Musk the richest person in the world with a net worth of $188.5 billion, Bloomberg reported.
The rally pushed Musk $1.5 billion past Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) CEO Jeff Bezos, Bloomberg reported.
The Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which is updated at the end of the trading day, shows that Bezos — the world’s richest man since 2017 — had $184 billion at the end of Wednesday, $3 billion more than Musk and more than $50 billion ahead of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who Musk surpassed in November. Musk started last year with $27 billion.
By June, Musk was ranked at No. 20 with a net worth of $24 billion, according to the sports-betting platform OLBG. That means Musk’s net worth has increased by more than $160 billion since then.
Shares of Tesla have soared almost 730% in the last year and closed at $816.04 per share on Thursday. The carmaker’s market cap was more than $773.5 billion on Thursday, topping Facebook Inc.’s at $765.45 billion.
Tesla’s stock will likely continue to climb with Democrats in control of the U.S. Senate, Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives wrote in a research note Thursday.
“A blue Senate is very bullish and a potential ‘game changer’ for Tesla and the overall EV sector, with a more green-driven agenda now certainly in the cards for the next few years,” Ives wrote. “We believe a doubling down on EV tax credits and further consumer incentives and government initiatives around the EV sector will be on the horizon which is a major positive for Tesla, GM, Rivian, Fisker and other auto players/EV supply chain (QS, etc.).”
Musk, known for his outspoken social media presence, commented on the news on Twitter on Thursday.
“How strange,” Musk said in response to a tweet about his new net worth from Tesla Owners of Silicon Valley. “Well, back to work.”
How strange
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While serving as the acting head of sales, marketing and communications, she oversaw Nintendo Switch game launches including Pokémon Legends: Arceus, Kirby and the Forgotten Land and Nintendo Switch Sports.
‘I’ve always liked the quote, “You can’t control the wind, but you can adjust your sail,” and that is just what we did.’
Angel investor and former C-suite data officer Anita Lynch is among the new appointments.
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