Jeff Bezos has dethroned Elon Musk as the world’s richest person for the first time since the fall of 2021.
As of Monday’s closing bell, the 60-year-old Amazon founder tops the Bloomberg billionaire list with a whopping $200 billion net worth, most of which comes from a 9% stake in the e-commerce giant. . According to calculations by Bloomberg.
Musk’s fortune reached $198 billion at market close, with French luxury goods magnate Bernard Arnault of LVMH rounding out the top three with $197 billion.
Year-to-date, Bezos has added another $23.4 billion to his fortune. Roughly $8.5 billion came from the tech tycoon’s sale of 50 million Amazon shares.
Last month, Mr. Bezos sold a lot of stock in his company, which he founded in his Seattle garage in 1994. The company’s stock price has increased nearly 19% since the beginning of the year.
The sale included four transactions under a prearranged trading plan that would allow him to sell up to 50 million Amazon shares by January 31, 2025.
But he completed the sale within two weeks, netting $8.5 billion, according to securities filings.
Bezos’ personal wealth also comes from the space exploration company he founded in 2000, Blue Origin, and his $250 million acquisition of the Washington Post in 2013, according to Bloomberg.
Mr. Bezos recently moved from his longtime home in Seattle to Miami’s luxury Indian Creek Island, claiming he was doing so to be closer to his parents and Blue Origin’s Sunshine State manufacturing and sales hub.
The withdrawal also saved Bezos millions of dollars in taxes. For individuals, Florida has no income or capital gains taxes.
Meanwhile, Washington state imposes a 7% tax on capital gains on stocks and bonds over $250,000 as of 2022.
Washington also imposes a 0.98% property tax, which is higher than Florida’s 0.89% tax on real estate. According to Rocket Mortgage.
Mr. Bezos and his fiancée Lauren Sanchez used their latest fortune to buy two mansions on the island known as the “Billionaire Bunker” for a total of $147 million.
The duck is also known to have spent downtime on Bezos’ $500 million superyacht, which features a helicopter landing pad, swimming pool and a mermaid resembling Sanchez on the bow.
Mr. Bezos’ recent fortune has ousted Mr. Musk from the title of number one richest person, which he has held since 2021, when his total fortune exceeded a staggering $300 billion.
According to Bloomberg, most of Musk’s wealth comes from his largest asset, a 13% stake in Tesla, making him the electric car maker’s largest and most influential shareholder.
Musk, who is also CEO of SpaceX, has increased his stake in the world’s most valuable car company to 25% (800% of Tesla’s stock) to continue his efforts in artificial intelligence and robotics. He said he wanted to increase the amount to more than $1 billion. .
Still, Musk’s net worth has been hurt by the volatility in Tesla’s stock price, which has fallen more than 24% so far in 2024.
