To make sure you never miss out on your favourite NEW stories, we're happy to send you some reminders

Click 'OK' then 'Allow' to enable notifications

Elon Musk Set To Become The Third Richest Person In The World

Elon Musk Set To Become The Third Richest Person In The World

It's been a good few days for Tesla

Claire Reid

Claire Reid

Elon Musk looks set to become the third richest man in the world, after seeing his personal wealth shoot up by more than $15bn (£11.3bn).

Yesterday it was announced that Musk's car company Tesla had been accepted into major US stock market index S&P 500, which sent its share price up by around 14 percent.

PA

A spokesman for S&P Dow Jones Indices told the BBC: "[Tesla] will be one of the largest weight additions to the S&P 500 in the last decade, and consequently will generate one of the largest funding trades in S&P 500 history."

Musk has a 20 percent stake in Tesla, so it was a pretty good day for him and his bank balance.

His fortune has increased by an eye-watering $90bn this year as Tesla's share price has continued to rise.

As a result, if the Tesla shares hold when trading opens today, it looks as though Musk will become the third richest person in the world, behind Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates.

PA

He's making his way up that list at a rate of knots - having been announced as the fourth richest man in the world in August.

Tesla was the cause of that surge in his wealth, too, with the electric car company seeing an 11 percent on rise, and closing at a record high.

It's been a funny old week for the 49-year-old, who caused a Twitter stir after claiming there was something 'bogus' going on with coronavirus testing and seeing one of his SpaceX launches blast off.

On Saturday, Musk told his Twitter followers he'd taken four coronavirus tests after experiencing 'symptoms of a typical cold'.

PA

He claimed of the four tests he took, two were positive and two were negative.

Posting on Twitter, Musk said: "Something extremely bogus is going on. Was tested for Covid four times today. Two tests came back negative, two came back positive. Same machine, same test, same nurse. Rapid antigen test from BD."

While later that weekend, NASA and SpaceX sent astronauts Shannon Walker, Mike Hopkins and Victor Glover, along with Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi into space... alongside a cuddly Baby Yoda.

After the crew embarked on their journey in the SpaceX Dragon capsule their companion was revealed as the cute character from The Mandalorian.

The crew members kept Baby Yoda a top secret until they reached zero-gravity and their fifth passenger popped out.

Featured Image Credit: PA

Topics: elon musk