The world’s richest man just got a lot richer. Elon Musk, thanks to Tesla’s stock price racing higher following a strong earnings report, saw his net worth increase $26.9 billion on Thursday.
That pushed his net worth to $270.4 billion, according to Forbes’ real-time billionaires tracker. Musk, who runs Tesla, SpaceX and X, now leads Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, the guy behind him in the rich guy rankings, by $58.2 billion. (Ellison is worth $212.2 billion.)
The 53-year-old Musk saw his net worth surge on Thursday because Tesla’s stock price jumped 21.9% percent — marking the car company’s biggest single-day stock increase since 2013. Tesla’s stock moved up after the company reported better-than-anticipated Q3 earnings on Wednesday.
Even with the Thursday boost, Musk has been richer at previous points in his life, like in late 2021, when he became the world’s first person worth $300 billion.
Tesla’s chief executive has been busy of late, and not just with his electric car company. SpaceX pulled off an unprecedented rocket landing earlier this month by grabbing a descending rocket using “pincer-like arms more familiarly known as chopsticks,” CBS reported.
Musk’s also been busy trying to get his preferred presidential candidate, Donald Trump, back in the White House.
He publicly endorsed Trump after his first assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July. Since then, he’s posted on X in favor of Trump, hosted a live conversation with him on X Spaces in August, and joined Trump on stage when he returned to Butler earlier this month.
Musk has also put a lot of money into helping Trump beat Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. Musk reported last week he’d donated $75 million to America PAC, his pro-Trump political action committee. America PAC’s website, which includes a picture of Musk in his “dark MAGA” hat, lists a handful of top priorities, including free speech, safe cities and secure borders.
Vice President Harris, meanwhile, isn’t hurting for big money donors, either.
Harris has raised more than $1 billion since replacing President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee in July, and her backers include Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, former Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman.
On Tuesday, it was reported Bill Gates — who Forbes ranks as the 12th richest man in the world, with a net worth of $105 billion — donated $50 million to help Harris win the election.
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