Elon Musk may be poised to surpass Jeff Bezos as richest man on earth

Sputnik news agency and radio 14:10 GMT 07.01.2021

With Musk's net worth reaching $181.1 bln this month, it is only about $3 billion shy of the wealth of Jeff Bezos, CEO and founder of Amazon.

A recent increase in market value of electric car manufacturer Tesla Inc has effectively propelled the company CEO Elon Musk to the position of the second-wealthiest person in the world.

As Tesla closed trading on Wednesday with a 2.8 percent gain, raising its total value to $717 billion, Bloomberg points out that Musk's net worth reached $181.1 billion, which is only about $3 billion shy of the fortune owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who has held the top spot in the magazine's Billionaire Index since October 2017.

The magazine also points out that Musk's fortune "soared by more than $150 billion" during the last year "in possibly the fastest bout of wealth creation in history", and suggests that he might be poised to surpass Jeff Bezos' net worth and thus become the richest man in the world.

According to AFP, Tesla exhibited the aforementioned gains as it joined S&P 500, "establishing the company as one of the world's most valuable businesses", with industry analysts remaining optimistic about Tesla's sales prospects despite the fact that the cars produced by this manufacturer "remain out of reach for many buyers".

With the price for Tesla's electric cars in the US market starting at $37,990, Musk had already expressed his desire to field a $25,000 model in "three years-ish", adding, "it is absolutely critical that we make cars that people can actually afford".