Elon Musk.Photo: Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post via Getty
Elon Muskis breaking records. But not the one he wants to be.
Earlier this month,Guinness World Recordsannounced that the billionaire entrepreneur has broken a more than 20-year-old record for the largest loss of personal fortune ever.
Most of the losses stem from the poor performance of Tesla’s stock, which has fallen from a peak of $320 billion in 2021 to $138 billion at the start of 2023, Guinness said. Musk’spurchase of social network Twitter for $44 billionin April 2022 accelerated the “alarming decline” of his net worth, the record keepers added.
“As Elon Musk continues to build his own tech conglomerate,” Guinness wrote in their post about the news, “we won’t be surprised to see him bounce back too at some point in the future.”
As Guinness explained, the net worth of billionaires will often fluctuate since much of it comes from shares and investments.
“As the market valuation of these investments fluctuates, so too does their owner’s apparent wealth,” the post on the Guinness site reads.
“This is doubly true of ‘self-made’ billionaires such as Musk or former record-holder Masayoshi Son because their net worth is usually derived almost entirely from the market valuation of the company they founded (although Musk wasn’t actually an original founder of Tesla; he was an early investor),” they added. “If their company’s share price tumbles, so does their net worth.”
A rep for Musk did not immediate respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
As of Tuesday, Musk is the second richest man in the world, with a net worth of $132 billion, according to theBloomberg Billionaires Index.
He only trailsBernard Arnault, the head of luxury goods conglomerate LVMH, who holds a net worth of $186 billion.
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is currently third, with a net worth of $121 billion.
source: people.com
