World’s top 10 richest people earned $222 billion in 6 months

The world’s richest people have posted jaw-dropping gains in the past 6 months. Ten of the wealthiest individuals according to the Bloomberg billionaires index gained a massive $221.52 billion in the past 6 months alone.

Bernard Arnault, the CEO of Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy (LVMH) is the biggest dollar gainer among this elite group, posting year-to-date gains of about $56.7 billion. He is presently the third richest person in the world with a wealth valuation of $171 billion ensuing from his business empire of more than 70 brands including Sephora.

The media-shy billionaires, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, founders of Google, have recorded decent gains with investors increasingly holding on to the tech juggernaut’s shares.

Larry Page, who is currently worth $112 billion, has earned $29.2 billion in the last 6 months, while Sergey Brin, with a wealth valuation of $108 billion, earned $28.1 billion over the same period. Collectively, these Google billionaires earned $57.3 billion in barely 6 months.

Mark Zuckerberg the youngest person ever to be worth over $100 billion recently got a massive boost after Facebook became the fifth American company to hit a $1 trillion valuation in just 17 years of its existence.

The founder of Facebook is now estimated to be worth $129 billion after posting 6-month gains of $25.8 billion as stock traders and global investors piled into Facebook Shares (the owners of Instagram and Whatsapp) on the basis of its recent favourable legal ruling.

Steve Ballmer, the former Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft, has a net worth of $97.5 billion with year-to-date gains standing at $17.1 billion.

The billionaire is popularly known for owning the L.A. Clippers basketball team with the majority of his fortune coming from an estimated 4% stake in Microsoft.

The vocal tech billionaire, Elon Musk is popularly known for transforming the world’s most valuable carmaker, Tesla. His fast-growing space exploration company, SpaceX has posted gains of about $16 billion in the past 6 months and currently, he has a net worth pegged at $186 billion.

Founder of Microsoft, the biggest software company, Bill Gates has a net worth of $146 billion and posts year-to-date gains of $14.3 billion. The fourth richest person in the world currently holds about $60.9 billion in cash.

Warren Buffett, who is presently the CEO, Chairman, and biggest shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway, is estimated to be worth $101 billion, posting half-year gains of about $13.5 billion.

The 90-year-old, self-made billionaire is popularly known for his frugality and for selling chewing gum door to door at age six.

Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle currently has a net worth of $92.6 billion. The tech billionaire’s year to date gains currently stands at $12.2 billion. The software billionaire has been on the board of Tesla for over two years after he purchased 3 million shares in 2018.

Jeff Bezos, the founder of the trillion-dollar eCommerce company is still the world’s richest individual posting a net worth of $199 billion and year to date gain of about $8.62 billion despite divorcing his wife MacKenzie and transferring about 25% of his stake in Amazon to her. ( Source: Nairametrics)