1. Elon Musk: $320 billion
Elon Musk is one of the most controversial business figures, but what’s not under dispute is his wealth. Born in South Africa, Musk built Tesla into a leading player in the electric vehicle market, and is pushing space travel with his SpaceX venture.
Musk made a small fortune as an early shareholder of PayPal, and more recently purchased Twitter, which he renamed X. Musk has courted controversy in recent years, using drugs during a broadcast interview with top podcaster Joe Rogan and becoming more active politically, besides a range of other political pronouncements on X.
2. Jeff Bezos: $235 billion
As the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos became something of a household name in the dot-com boom of 1999-2000, but his wealth really took off after the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In the decade that followed, Amazon expanded into web services, logistics and shipping and more.
Bezos purchased the Washington Post in 2013 for $250 million and founded Blue Origin, an aerospace company that is commercializing space travel. He’s also a noted philanthropist, founding the Bezos Earth Fund in 2020 with a donation of $10 billion and has said that he will give away most of his fortune.
3. Mark Zuckerberg: $205 billion
Mark Zuckerberg is the founder of Meta Platforms, the company previously known as Facebook. The youngest member of this list, Zuckerberg began Facebook out of his dorm room at Harvard and quickly expanded it over the ensuing years.
4. Larry Ellison: $203 billion
Larry Ellison co-founded software company Oracle and ran it for decades before becoming its chief technology officer and executive chairman. Ellison also owns nearly all of the Hawaiian island of Lana’i.
5. Bernard Arnault: $164 billion
Bernard Arnault founded LVMH, a company that acquired various French fashion brands such as Christian Dior, Louis Vuitton, Moët and Hennessy. The luxury conglomerate acquired Tiffany more recently, and is among the largest companies in Europe by market capitalization.
6. Bill Gates: $162 billion
Bill Gates is the co-founder of Microsoft and has long been among the wealthiest people as his software company continued to expand over decades. Gates is also known for his philanthropic endeavors, namely at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a private charitable foundation.
7. Larry Page: $161 billion
Larry Page co-founded Google — subsequently renamed Alphabet — with another member of this list (No. 8). He headed up the company from 1997 to 2001 and then again from 2011 to 2019.
8. Sergey Brin: $151 billion
Along with Page, Sergey Brin co-founded Google and served as the company’s president for many years until stepping down in 2019. He and Page literally developed Google in a Silicon Valley garage.
9. Warren Buffett: $148 billion
Warren Buffett, long known as the Oracle of Omaha for his prophetic investment acumen, has been investing since he was a boy. He has been the head of Berkshire Hathaway, an investing conglomerate, for nearly 60 years.
Berkshire owns massive stakes in a number of America’s largest businesses, including Apple, Coca-Cola and many more. His company’s annual meeting attracts tens of thousands of investors and has been called the “Woodstock of Capitalism.”
10. Steve Ballmer: $148 billion
Steve Ballmer also made his fortune through Microsoft and was one of the company’s earliest executives. He eventually led the company from 2000 to 2014, and subsequently co-purchased the Los Angeles Clippers, a pro basketball franchise of the National Basketball Association.
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