Elon Musk just broke a world record. He probably won’t be happy about it. Elon Musk’s $182 billion net worth drop breaks Guinness World Record.
Elon Musk can add a new title to his resume: Guinness World Record holder.The “Technoking” of Tesla made it into the record books thanks to an abysmal 2022 which saw his fortune shrink by $182 billion, the organization announced Friday in a release that cited data from Forbes.
Guinness noted that although “the exact figure [of Musk’s loss] is almost impossible to ascertain,” with some outlets estimating that he lost more than $200 billion, the Twitter owner demolished the previous record: a $58.6 billion loss by Japanese investor Masayoshi Son in 2000.
Musk’s shrinking fortune was largely due to the steep slide of Tesla shares, which lost roughly 65% of their value during the company’s worst year on record.The loss was enough to knock him off his perch as the richest man in the world — a title now held by luxury goods magnate Bernard Arnault.Of course, Musk isn’t the only billionaire whose fortune took a hit in 2022. American billionaires collectively lost $660 billion last year, CNBC Make It previously reported.
The 53-year-old’s wealth decline spared Amazon founder Jeff Bezos from taking the Guinness World Record. Bezos’s $80 billion loss in 2022 would have firmly given him the “largest loss” title were it not for Musk. Fellow tech CEO Mark Zuckerberg also broke Masayoshi Son’s record with his $78 billion loss. Musk’s fortune once sat as high as $320 billion in late 2021. As of Jan. 10, Forbes estimates that his net worth sits at $142.1 billion, making him the No. 2 richest person in the world ahead of India’s
With his current net worth of about $137 billion, Musk also lost his status as the world’s richest man; the honor now belongs to LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy) founder Bernard Arnault, who owns an estimated $190 billion.
Notably, if it weren’t for Musk, another tech mogul would’ve claimed the record. According to Forbes, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos lost $85 billion in 2022, and Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg lost $77 billion. Don’t worry, though: None of the above are likely to go hungry any time soon, as their personal fortune is still measured in tens of billions.
