Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos Is Now World’s Richest Person, Surpasses Elon Musk

New York: Elon Musk is no longer the world’s richest person. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has dethroned Elon Musk as the world’s richest man after a surge in the share price of the online retail giant.

After more than nine months of being on the top of the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Musk lost his position to Jeff Bezos (60) as shares in Tesla Inc. tumbled 7.2 per cent on Monday.

Musk (52) now has a net worth of $197.7 billion whereas Bezos’ fortune is $200.3 billion.

Bezos, who owns a nine per cent stake in Amazon, overtook Microsoft Inc. co-founder Bill Gates as the world’s richest person in 2017. But with a massive growth in Tesla’s shares, Musk left Bezos behind in 2021.

The wealth gap between Musk and Bezos, which at one point was as wide as $142 billion, has, however, been shrinking. Amazon shares have more than doubled since late 2022 while Tesla’s is down by about 50 per cent from its 2021 peak.

According to reports, Tesla shares fell on Monday as data showed shipments from its factory in Shanghai slumped to the lowest in more than a year. Amazon, on the other hand, is coming off its best online sales growth since early in the pandemic.