First time someone not from big tech has been named world richest person in nine years
When Bernard Arnault took over as the world’s richest person today, he achieved quite an impressive record.
On Wednesday (7 December) Elon Musk, the self-proclaimed ‘Chief Twit’, briefly lost his place as the world’s richest person to the French business magnate.
Arnault, who is the chief executive of luxury brand Louis Vuitton’s parent company LVMH, along with his family, topped Forbes’ real time billionaire list with a personal wealth of $184.7 billion as it stands.
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Shortly after Arnault made it to number one, however, Musk leapfrogged back up to first place again with a personal wealth of $185.8 billion.
Although Arnault’s lead was short-lived, it marked the first time someone not from a big tech company had the honour of being the world’s richest person in nine years.
The last time this happened was in 2013, when Forbes published its 2013 billionaire list.
Carlos Slim is the chairman of the telecommunications company América Móvil and the Mexican global conglomerate Grupo Carso which he owns.
Slim had a net worth of $73 billion when he topped the Forbes list for the fourth consecutive year in 2013 at the age of 73.
He was first named the world’s richest person in 2010 when he narrowly eclipsed Microsoft’s Bill Gates, with an estimated net worth of $53.5 billion.
Slim remained at the top for the 25th annual Forbes list of global billionaires published in 2011 in which he added $20.5 billion to his fortune the most of anyone, and retained his number one ranking with a total fortune of $74 billion.
He also made the gap between himself and Gates to $18 billion.
However, in 2013 Slim and family’s net worth dropped to $69 billion while Gates rose to $61 billion. The positions remained the same.
The telecommunications mogul fell to second place in 2014, with an eye-watering $72 billion net worth. He was overtaken by Gates, who added $9 billion to his fortune since 2013 to a net worth of $76 billion.
At the time of writing, Forbes states that Arnault and his family are worth a staggering $184.7 billion.
While the Tesla CEO is back in first place, his net worth has dropped by $4.1 billion to $185.8 billion.
News of the Forbes chart switcheroo came after the value of Musk's Tesla stake dropped as investors dumped shares on the electric vehicle company over concerns that he would be more focused on his $44 billion takeover of Twitter.
Topics: Elon Musk, Money, Technology, Business
Gregory Robinson