Elon Musk, the founder of American electric vehicle and clean energy company, Tesla, has surpassed Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, to become the world’s second-richest person.
The 49-year-old entrepreneur net worth is now pegged at $128 billion, driven by yet another surge in Tesla’s share price, data retrieved from the Bloomberg billionaire index shows.
Musk has gained $100.3 billion to his net worth just in 2020, the most by anyone in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index – a ranking of the world’s 500 richest people.
Aside being the CEO of the California-based electric vehicles company, Musk is also the CEO of Space Exploration Technologies, a rocket manufacturer tapped by NASA to resupply the space station.
His wealth gain is largely attributed to Tesla, which has gained 500% in 2020 and has become by far the world’s most valuable automaker in the world, despite it producing far less than Volkswagen, Toyota, or General Motors.
About a fifth of the car company’s shares is owned by its Chief Executive, Elon Musk, and other insiders.
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Tesla was founded in 2003 by a group of engineers who wanted to prove that people did not need to compromise to drive electric – that electric vehicles can be better, quicker, and more fun to drive than gasoline cars.
The auto company, today, builds not only all-electric vehicles but also infinitely scalable clean energy generation and storage products. Tesla believes the faster the world stops relying on fossil fuels and moves towards a zero-emission future, the better.
Tesla remains the only major carmaker to have a huge physical presence in the world’s second-largest economy. With the electric-car maker’s launch of a new factory in China in 2019 and, the beginning of its Model Y models earlier this year, investors may want to continue holding.
