French billionaire Bernard Arnault tops the list as Forbes releases the annual billionaire list, replacing Elon Musk, who held the position for a year after succeeding Amazon founder Jeff Bezos after losing $57 billion in 2022. The Tesla and Twitter Boss is now the second richest billionaire, worth an estimated $180 billion, which is $39 billion lower than last year. The spot was awarded to Arnault French luxury goods giant LVHM after his net worth surged more than $50 billion in the past year to $211 billion.
Forbes explained that Musk’s wealth had fallen because his $44 billion Twitter purchase, funded by Tesla shares, scared investors and sent Tesla stock sinking sharply last year. Tesla gained much of those losses back this year but is still significantly lower than before Musk bought Twitter.
Forbes stated that “Musk has mostly tweeted himself out of the top spot on the ranks” because Tesla shares are down 50% since his Twitter takeover a year ago. SpaceX is a bright spot for the billionaire, the magazine notes since its valuation has increased from $13 billion to $140 billion over the past year.
Consequently, Jeff Bezos lost the most amount of money of any billionaire on the list ($57 billion), knocking him down from the second position to third. The loss can be attributed to Amazon shares losing nearly 40% of their value last year.
Forbes stated that Arnault had a “banner year” in 2022 because of record-high profits at the luxury conglomerate, which comprises Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior and Tiffany & Co. Shares of LVMH have climbed 25% over the past year and the patriarch has recently unveiled succession plans of his children.
Forbes said that the total number of billionaires on this year’s list fell to 2,640 (down from 2,668), marking the second-straight year of decline. The others who made it to the list included Oracle's Larry Ellison, Microsoft's Bill Gates, Berkshire Hathaway's Warren Buffett, and Bloomberg LP's Mike Bloomberg amongst others.
The total number of billionaires on this year's list fell from 2,688 to 2,640 making it the second straight year of fall off.
