Tesla CEO, Twitter's owner, and self-promoter Elon Musk is breaking the record of “worst loss of fortune,” according to Guinness World Records.
The Washington Post reports that according to Guinness World Records, Elon Musk, the tech billionaire, CEO, and founder of Tesla, has suffered his “worst loss of fortune in history.” Information taken from Forbes as well as the Bloomberg Billionaires Index states that between November 2021 and January 2022, Musk lost around $200 billion. Previous records were set by Japanese billionaire Masayoshi Son, the CEO of SoftBank, who lost $58.6 billion in the crash in 2000 of tech stocks. In the context of inflation, the loss would be roughly $100 billion in today's dollars.
The loss comes as a result of Musk's $44 billion purchase of Twitter in which he sacked many employees. Investors in Tesla, the electric car manufacturer which Musk owns, have expressed their concern because of this, claiming Musk is spending all of his time trying to enhance Twitter while ignoring Tesla. Tesla shares have dropped 39 percent since the 1st of December, 2022.
Estimating the net worth of a person at a specific point in time is a challenge because external influences like the economy or the policy of a government could cause major fluctuations within the price of stocks that is linked to a business's net worth. This can happen in a short time.
Musk did however play an important role in the genesis of his financial troubles. Musk sold off a significant part of his Tesla shares to pay for a price increase for Twitter at a time the electric car company has seen an increase in rivalry in the car market, chip and raw material shortages, delays in production, and late deadlines.
In the report by Bloomberg News, Musk's space manufacturing company SpaceX is responsible for around 37 percent of Musk's wealth and shares of Tesla make up around 33 percent. The remainder is made up of shares of Twitter, the Boring Company, and ill-advised brain chip maker Neuralink.
The decline in the worth of Tesla stock is the primary reason responsible for the recent drop of Musk's wealth. Musk has repeatedly linked this to macroeconomic changes including the historically high interest rates that were set by the Federal Reserve.
In the last month, in a conversation on Twitter regarding the importance of Tesla, along with Tesla shareholder Ross Gerber, Musk tweeted, “As bank savings account interest rates, which are guaranteed, start to approach stock market returns, which are *not* guaranteed, people will increasingly move their money out of stocks into cash, thus causing stocks to drop.”
Musk appeared to be acknowledging the concerns of investors who feel it is a risk to invest in Twitter by tweeting in December “I will make sure Tesla shareholders benefit from Twitter long-term.”
The chairman and CEO of French luxury retail giant LVMH, Bernard Arnault, was able to surpass Musk as the richest man on the planet. As per Bloomberg's Billionaires Index, Arnault's net worth at the time of writing is $182 billion. Forbes reports Musk's worth at $182 billion. Forbes estimates that Musk will be worth $146.5 billion, and Arnault and his family are worth $204 billion.
