Who tops the list of world’s wealthiest? Shifting stock values shakeup the Bloomberg rankings

NEW YORK – Elon Musk has reclaimed the title of world’s wealthiest person on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a listing of the 500 richest people in the world.

Bloomberg’s tally released Thursday showed Musk, the CEO of Tesla, with a net worth of about $192 billion. He was followed by Bernard Arnault of France. Arnault is CEO of LVMH, a French multinational holding and conglomerate specializing in luxury goods.

Bloomberg’s listing pegged Arnault’s net worth at $187 billion.

The two centibillionaires, a term used to refer to people with fortunes of more than $100 billion, have been neck-and-neck for the top spot for months, CNN Business reported.

Arnault’s net worth surpassed Musk in December thanks to a boom in sales of luxury goods that helped drive up LVMH’s stock price, CNN Business said. LVMH is home to brands including Louis Vuitton, Dior and Celine.

But a drop in LVMH’s stock this week caused Arnault’s wealth to dip, according to Bloomberg calculations. LVMH’s shares are up 19.7% this year.

Musk, of the United States, has shot up Bloomberg’s list of the wealthiest in recent years as Tesla has gained value. Tesla shares have risen 65.6% in the year to date.

Stock in the electric car company is Musk’s single biggest asset. He owns about 13% of the company’s stock, according to Bloomberg.

Musk is also CEO of SpaceX, the space exploration firm, and the owner of social network Twitter.

Rounding out Bloomberg’s top 10 were eight more U.S. billionaires. They are entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, former CEO of Amazon, $146 billion; Bill Gates, Microsoft founder and philanthropist, $126 billion; Larry Ellison, chief technology officer of Oracle, $118 billion; Steve Balmer, owner of the NBA Los Angeles Clippers and former CEO of Microsoft, $115 billion; Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, $113 billion; Larry Page, co-founder of Google and former CEO of Alphabet, $112 billion; Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google and former president of Alphabet, $106 billion; and Mark Zuckerberg, executive chairman, CEO and controlling stockholder of Meta, Facebook’s parent company, $99.2 billion.