The world just got its first trillionaire. SpaceX's stock market debut on Friday pushed Elon Musk's fortune past $1 trillion, a line no person had ever crossed.
Most of Musk's wealth sits in two companies. His SpaceX stake is now worth more than $766 billion.
His Tesla stake adds about $280 billion. Put those together and you get roughly $1.05 trillion.
Friday's debut alone added more than $180 billion in one day. Most of that gain came from SpaceX shares no one could buy until Friday.
Tesla helped too, rising almost 2% as SpaceX soared. Both companies climbing at once is what pushed him over the line.
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Numbers this large are hard to picture, so try it this way. Musk is now worth more than the next five richest people put together.
His fortune is also larger than the whole economy of a country like Sweden. To see the gap at the top, look at second place.
That spot belongs to Google's Larry Page, at around $295 billion. Musk is worth more than three times that.
The next names, like Jeff Bezos, each sit above $200 billion. Even Bill Gates would rank higher if he had not given so much to charity.
His pile even tops the yearly output of Taiwan or Ireland. Very few people in history have come close.
This did not happen overnight. Forbes first called Musk a billionaire back in 2012, when it pegged him at $2.4 billion.
By 2019 he was worth $20 billion, and then things sped up. A Tesla stock split the next year helped lift him past $100 billion.
His wealth has grown about tenfold in the six years since. For most of that time, much of it sat locked inside private companies.
The IPO finally turned a paper fortune into a public one. It also made thousands of new millionaires among SpaceX staff.
One person worth $1 trillion is bound to stir things up. Some see proof that big tech founders now hold too much power.
Others see a payoff for huge risks that few people would take. Either way, the gap between Musk and everyone else has never looked wider.
Lawmakers who want higher taxes on the rich now have a fresh target. Musk's record lands right in the middle of that fight.
The title may not stay quiet for long. Musk being first is already feeding the debate over how much wealth one person should hold.
Plenty of people are already split on whether that is fair.
It took him 14 years to go from his first billion to his first trillion.
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