Elon Musk has dropped out of the $200 billion club. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO’s wealth dipped by $13.3 billion on Wednesday, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index, as Tesla shares dropped for the fourth day in a row.
Shares of the automaker slipped to their lowest point since September as stocks tanked worldwide amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Musk’s net worth now sits at $198.6 billion, below $200 billion for the first time since September. So far this year, Musk has seen $71.7 billion erased from his fortune, eclipsing the losses of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault, and Microsoft founder Bill Gates combined, according to Bloomberg.
Still, Musk remains the world’s wealthiest person, outpacing Bezos by about $30 billion.
Musk’s fortune skyrocketed throughout 2021, reaching an all-time high of $340 billion in November. Though the majority of his wealth is derived from his 17% stake in Tesla, Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas predicted recently that Musk could be the first person to reach trillionaire status thanks to his space exploration venture, SpaceX.
Musk first became the world’s richest person in January 2021, although he and Bezos leapfrogged one another for several weeks amid daily fluctuations of Tesla’s and Amazon’s stock.
Musk does not take a paycheck from Tesla and has said that he’s “cash-poor.” He signed the Giving Pledge in 2021, vowing to give away the majority of his wealth during his lifetime or upon his death, and he’s also pledged to sell off his properties and worldly possessions to fund his goal of building a colony on Mars.
