Elon Musk has become the richest man in the world, with his total income and net worth exceeding $ 185bn (£ 136bn).
The Tesla and SpaceX businessman was pushed to the top after Tesla’s share price rose on Thursday.
He replaces Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who has been holding the top spot since 2017.
Elon’s Reaction
Mr Musk’s electric car company Tesla has risen sharply this year, receiving a market capitalization of $ 700bn (£ 516bn) for the first time on Wednesday.
That makes the car company more expensive than Toyota, Volkswagen, Hyundai, GM and Ford combined.
Mr Musk reacted to the news in signature style, replying to a Twitter user sharing the news with the remark “how strange”.
An old tweet posted at the top of the richest man’s feed provided more insight into his thoughts on personal wealth.
“About half of my money is aimed at helping Earth’s problems, and half of it is helping to establish a self-sustaining city on Mars to ensure survival (of all species) in the event Earth getting hit by a meteor-like the dinosaurs or WW3 happens and we destroy ourselves,” it reads.
The tycoon’s fortunes have been buoyed by politics in the US, where the Democrats will have control of the US Senate in the forthcoming session.
Democrat’s Senate Impact
Daniel Ives, an analyst at Wedbush Securities, wrote: “The Blue Senate is very active and can ‘change the game’ for Tesla and the rest of the electric car industry, with a green agenda now on the cards for the next few years.”
Expected electric vehicle tax credits would benefit Tesla, “which continues to have an iron grip on the market today”, he added.
The Rivalry
Mr Bezos also saw his wealth increase this past year. The coronavirus pandemic means that Amazon has benefited from a strong demand for its online services and cloud computing services.
However, he gave a 4% share of the business to his ex-wife MacKenzie Scott after their divorce, which helped Mr Musk pass him by.
In addition, regulatory threats meant that Amazon stocks did not rise as high as it could.
The owner of a business that has just made its first annual profit and is now minnow compared to the likes of Toyota – or Amazon – is now the richest person in the world.
The fact that Tesla’s stock price has increased more than seven times in the past year has sent Elon Musk’s fortune more than Jeff Bezos’.
Believing that the value of an electric car manufacturer can increase dramatically in just 12 months is an example of unreasonable happiness.
It means Musk will have to show over the next five years that Tesla could make the most profit in the automotive industry combined to prove its mettle.
Mind you, his many fans will point out that the somewhat eccentric tycoon has constantly confounded the sceptics who bet that he would go bust.
And exactly 20 years ago another tech watchdog was facing a catastrophic face when the dot com bubble exploded and big profits seemed like a distant dream – but Jeff Bezos went on to make those Amazon bets richer.
