Elon Musk's net worth plunged last week as tech stocks got hammered and Tesla shares' stunning rise quickly unraveled.
Wall Street is growing increasingly nervous about rising bond yields, which could make borrowing more expensive. That could eat into corporate profits, which is why investors have begun to reverse some of the positions they took over the past year in high-growth but risky tech stocks like Tesla.
Tesla's (TSLA) stock fell 11.5% last week. Musk, who owns nearly 18% of Tesla's shares, bore most of the brunt of that massive sell-off.
Musk's wealth fell by $27 billion last week, according to Bloomberg's Billionaires Index. The decline in his net value is roughly equal to the entire fortune held by Dyson founder James Dyson -- the 52nd richest person in the world, according to Bloomberg.
Musk and Amazon (AMZN) CEO Jeff Bezos have been swapping places atop Bloomberg's list of richest people in the world since January. But Musk now sits in a distant second place: $157 billion, compared to Bezos' net worth of $177 billion. Musk remains $21 billion ahead of Microsoft (MSFT) founder Bill Gates, who remains the third-richest person on the planet.
Tesla's stock gained 743% in 2020, propelling it to No. 5 on the list of most valuable companies on the stock market. After losing 15% this year, Tesla's stock has since fallen to No. 7, behind Facebook (FB) and Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA) but ahead of JPMorgan Chase (JPM).
Source: CNN
