His case has been the most famous. But Elon Musk was not the only one. Other tech moguls, like Jeff Bezos or Mark Zuckerberg, also lost their luck in 2022.
In recent months, many Wall Street companies have had to face countless layoffs and a crisis that jeopardized the profitability of their businesses. Not even Musk, who was said to be the richest person in the world, was hit hard by this cyclone. Although there was an exception: the founder of TikTok, the Chinese Zhang Yiming. His fortune grew by $10.4 billion in 2022 to $55 billion, making him the 23rd richest person in the world.
Elon Musk and the Twitter debacle
It all started on October 27. After months of legal disputes between the platform and billionaire Elon Musk to reach an agreement, he improved to buy Twitter for 44,000 million dollars. But this was not exactly favorable for their business. Shares of electric vehicle maker Tesla, a former favorite for investors, plunged.
The South African tycoon ceased to occupy the first position of the wealthiest people in the world – he was ousted by Frenchman Bernard Arnault. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index puts his loss at
Musk’s decisions at the head of Twitter generated special controversy, such as the dismissal of half of the company’s staff or the reopening of the account of former US President Donald Trump, which had been closed for inciting violence.
Zuckerberg and Bezos also lost their fortune in 2022
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s efforts to promote the metaverse as the future of the internet weren’t enough. 66% in market value since the beginning of the year as a result of inflation and increased competition. Hence, the fortune of the American magnate went from 81,000 million dollars to 44,000 million.
The same happened to Jeff Bezos with his fortune, who dedicated much of his time to space exploration with his company Blue Origin. Despite the fact that he left the CEO of Amazon in July 2021, his wealth remains strongly tied to the value of the shares of this e-commerce corporation, which have fallen more than 49% in 2022.
Last year, the former executive director of Amazon’s board of directors, lost more than 86,000 million dollars. However, it is estimated that his fortune is around 106,000 million dollars.
The case of Larry Page and Sergey Brin
Although they are no longer in charge of the company since they resigned in 2019 from their executive positions at the parent company Alphabet -which also includes YouTube and Gmail-, the two founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, have seen how it has had an impact on his fortune the fall of 39% of the actions. This is due to declining ad revenue and competition from rivals like TikTok.
Thus, Page’s fortune fell by $46.1 billion and Brin’s by $44.8 billion. But they still sit on the Alphabet board of directors, of which they are the largest individual shareholders, and remain among the richest people in the world: Page is in 10th place, with $82.3 billion, and Brin is 11th, with $78.8 billion.
