- Tech mogul Elon Musk has an estimated internet price of $264 billion.
- His estimated fortune peaked at round $340 billion in November 2021 as Tesla shares soared.
Elon Musk has a internet price of round $264 billion, based on estimates by Bloomberg.
His internet price, which is carefully tied to Tesla’s share worth, acquired an enormous enhance within the wake of the information that Donald Trump had received reelection as Tesla shares soared to their highest degree for the reason that starting of the yr.
But the tech mogul’s wealth comes from numerous sources and it is not secure. Musk is at the moment the world’s richest particular person and different billionaires are shut on his heels, too: Jeff Bezos is $43 billion behind Musk, whereas Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is at the moment $18 billion under Bezos.
How has Musk’s internet price modified over time?
Musk, who was born in South Africa, moved to Canada and dropped out of a Ph.D. at Stanford, grew to become a millionaire earlier than he hit 30. Musk began Zip2, a web site that offered metropolis journey guides to newspapers, together with his brother Kimbal Musk, and offered it to Compaq for greater than $300 million in 1999. Musk, then aged 27, is believed to have gotten $22 million from the deal.
He went on to cofound on-line financial institution X.com in 1999. It quickly merged with Peter Thiel’s Confinity to grow to be PayPal, and the corporate was purchased for $1.5 billion by eBay in 2002. Despite having been ousted as CEO, Musk walked away with round $165 million.
Musk cofounded space-exploration firm SpaceX in 2002. In 2004, he grew to become an investor in and chairman of EV firm Tesla.
During the monetary disaster in 2008, he saved Tesla from chapter with a $40 million funding and a $40 million mortgage. That identical yr, he was named Tesla’s CEO.
Musk mentioned 2008 was “the worst yr of my life.” Alongside issues in his private life, Tesla saved dropping cash and SpaceX was having bother launching the primary model of its Falcon rocket. By 2009, Musk was residing off private loans.
But Tesla went public in 2010, and Musk’s estimated internet price steadily climbed. In 2012 he debuted on Forbes’ Billionaires List with an estimated wealth of $2 billion.
In 2016, Musk arrange the tunnel-digging enterprise the Boring Company.
The subsequent yr, he based neurotechnology startup Neuralink.
Musk’s internet price started a speedy ascent at the beginning of the pandemic as Tesla inventory costs soared. Musk began 2020 with an estimated internet price of slightly below $30 billion and was price round $170 billion only a yr later – a greater than five-fold enhance in only a yr. His estimated fortune peaked at round $340 billion in November 2021.
Musk additionally purchased Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022, serving as its CEO till he stood down in early June 2023.
But it is tumbled since then: Tesla inventory was down 56% by the top of January 2024, slashing the corporate’s worth from over $1.2 trillion to under $600 billion.
Musk’s internet price declined by $15 billion after Tesla’s “We, Robot” day on October 10 when it unveiled its extremely anticipated robotaxi lineup. While the occasion turned heads with dancing robots and glossy autonomous autos providing rides to friends, it left traders with query marks surrounding the economics of the ride-hailing service.
Following a giant earnings beat later that month, Tesla’s inventory surged by 22%, main Musk’s internet price to extend by about $30 billion. The morning of Trump’s reelection on November 6, which Musk closely campaigned for, Tesla’s inventory was up about 15% to $289.37 per share after the market opened, the best it is hit all yr.
Where does Musk’s fortune come from?
Musk’s wealth is essentially depending on Tesla shares. Though he takes no wage from Tesla, he is awarded inventory choices when the corporate hits difficult efficiency metrics.
“Elon will obtain no assured compensation of any form — no wage, no money bonuses, and no fairness that vests just by the passage of time,” Tesla mentioned in 2018 when the corporate introduced a 10-year efficiency award for Musk. “Instead, Elon’s solely compensation might be a 100% at-risk efficiency award, which ensures that he might be compensated provided that Tesla and all of its shareholders do terribly properly.”
Investors had initially permitted the $55 billion compensation plan in 2018, however a Delaware decide voided it in January on grounds that Musk had undue affect over the package deal and its approval resulting from shut ties with a number of board members.
At its annual shareholder assembly in June, traders voted to approve Musk’s pay package deal.
According to Bloomberg, near half of Musk’s internet price comes from Tesla shares, whereas simply over 20% comes from SpaceX inventory.
The remainder of his wealth comes from shares in Twitter and The Boring Company, in addition to different miscellaneous liabilities.
