Bill Gates surpasses Jeff Bezos, reclaims world richest man title
Billionaire Bill Gates has officially surpassed Amazon Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Jeff Bezos at world’s richest person on earth with a net worth of $110 billion (N39,765,000,000,000).
The Amazon founder ended Gates’ 24-year run as the richest man in 2018 with a net worth of $160 billion (N57,840,000,000,000).
However, the Microsoft co-founder regained the lead on Friday, November 15, after Microsoft stock went up nearly 48% in 2019, helping boost the value of his stake in the tech giant, CNN reports.
Gates may have never relinquished the top spot were it not for his philanthropy. Photo: Getty Images.
The rest of his wealth is derived from share sales and investments made over the years by his family office, Cascade.
Gates had briefly topped Bezos as the world’s richest man in October 2019, after Amazon’s lacklustre Q3 results resulted in Bezos losing nearly $7 billion (N2,530,500,000,000) in stock value.
Bezos would be far richer if he and MacKenzie Bezos had not divorced in January 2019. Photo: Getty Images
The index, which tracks the wealth of the richest 500 people, is updated each trading day after U.S. markets close. Europe’s richest person, Bernard Arnault, is third with $102.7 billion.
Gates debuted on Forbes’ first-ever billionaire list in 1987 with a net worth of $1.25 billion (KSh 127.5 billion).
Bezos first joined The Forbes 400 list of richest Americans in 1998, one year after Amazon went public, with a net worth of $1.6 billion (over N361,500,000,000).
Bezos would be far richer if he and MacKenzie Bezos had not divorced in January 2019, with MacKenzie receiving a quarter of their Amazon holdings in July 2019.
Gates, on the other hand, may have never relinquished the top spot were it not for his philanthropy. He has donated more than $35 billion (N12,652,500,000,000) to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation since 1994.
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