Billionaires play an outsized role in shaping the global economy, politics, and philanthropy. Forbes puts the number of billionaires in the world at 2,781 in 2024. The wealthiest among them is Elon Musk; CEO of Tesla and SpaceX
The individuals on this list belong to an even more exclusive club and wield still more power. Many are founders of technology giants, with much of their wealth still invested in the companies they started.
These billionaires can, however, still borrow against that wealth to avoid selling stock, deferring (or eliminating for heirs) taxes on in the process. Multi-billionaires can also take advantage of a panoply of tax deductions to offset reported income, leaving some on this list paying no income tax in recent years
With so much of their wealth in publicly traded stocks, the net worth of the richest fluctuates along with the market valuations of the companies they own. Below are the 10 wealthiest people on the planet, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. All figures are current as of Dec. 2, 2024.
- Elon Musk
- Age: 53
- Residence: United States
- Co-founder and CEO: Tesla
- Net Worth: $343 billion
- Tesla Ownership Stake: 13% ($142 billion)
- X Ownership Stake: 79% ($5.62 billion)
- Other Assets: Space Exploration Technologies ($82.2 billion private asset), The Boring Company ($3.33 billion private asset), Neuralink ($2.07 billion private asset), xAI ($25 billion private asset)
Elon Musk
Richest People in the World
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Updated December 02, 2024
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Elon Musk
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Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
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Billionaires play an outsized role in shaping the global economy, politics, and philanthropy. Forbes puts the number of billionaires in the world at 2,781 in 2024. The wealthiest among them is Elon Musk; CEO of Tesla and SpaceX.12
The individuals on this list belong to an even more exclusive club and wield still more power. Many are founders of technology giants, with much of their wealth still invested in the companies they started.
These billionaires can, however, still borrow against that wealth to avoid selling stock, deferring (or eliminating for heirs) taxes on unrealized capital gains in the process. Multi-billionaires can also take advantage of a panoply of tax deductions to offset reported income, leaving some on this list paying no income tax in recent years.34Y
With so much of their wealth in publicly traded stocks, the net worth of the richest fluctuates along with the market valuations of the companies they own. Below are the 10 wealthiest people on the planet, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. All figures are current as of Dec. 2, 2024.
Key STORNGS
- Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, is the richest person and the richest man in the world with a net worth of $343 billion.
- After Musk is Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.
- Other billionaires with some of the largest net worths include LVMH’s Arnault, Microsoft’s Bill Gates, and Oracle’s Larry Ellison.
- Eight of the top 10 billionaires made their fortunes in technology, with Arnault and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett being the exceptions.
1. Elon Musk
- Age: 53
- Residence: United States
- Co-founder and CEO: Tesla
- Net Worth: $344 billion
- Tesla Ownership Stake: 13% ($142 billion)
- X Ownership Stake: 79% ($5.62 billion)
- Other Assets:Space Exploration Technologies ($82.2 billion private asset), The Boring Company ($3.33 billion private asset), Neuralink ($2.07 billion private asset), xAI ($25 billion private asset)5
Bloomberg. “Elon Musk.”
Elon Musk
Elon Musk is the richest man in the world. He was born in South Africa and attended a university in Canada before transferring to the University of Pennsylvania, where he in physics and economics
Two days after enrolling in a graduate physics program at Stanford University, Musk deferred attendance to launch Zip2, one of the earliest online navigation services. He reinvested a portion of the proceeds from this startup to create X.com, the online payment system that was sold to eBay (and ultimately became PayPal Holdings In December 2020, Tesla joined the becoming the largest company added, and in January 2021, Musk became the richest person in the world—a title that has fluctuated alongside the value of Tesla In April 2022, which culminated in a $44 billion buyout. Musk planned to fund the deal with $21 billion of his own capital. In the run-up to the buyout announcement, Musk sold 9.6 million shares of Tesla, valued at roughly $8.5 billion In July 2022, Musk decided to back out of the buyout. The company filed a lawsuit against Musk to force the buyout to go through. Musk countersued the company but then reversed course and declared he was willing to buy it after all. The deal officially closed in Oct. 2022, giving him a 79% stake in the company