Elon Musk now richest man in the world worth $200 billion

South African born Elon Musk has become the richest person in the world after Tesla stock surged and raised his net worth to $200 billion, making him the third person ever to be hit this figure Forbes reported on Tuesday.

Elon Musk follows hot on the trail of billionaire Amazon founder and space rival Jeff Bezos’ who first reached the $200 billion wealth mark in August 2020.  Tycoon Bernard Arnault also hit the wealth mark high briefly in August.  

“Shares of Musk’s electric vehicle company Tesla continued a four-month rally, closing up 2.2% at $791.36, the highest they’ve been since February this year. Musk became $3.8 billion richer on Monday and was worth $203.4 billion at the close of markets. He surpasses Bezos, whose fortune fell by $1 billion Monday to $197.7 billion due to a 0.6%  decline in Amazon stock,” Forbes wealth and tech reporter Kenrick Cai reported.

The latest surge in Tesla’s shares has made Musk richer now than he was when Tesla’s value  peaked in January, and he jumped to the top spot as the richest man in the world, booting out Bezos, albeit only briefly. This was after he obtained additional stock option grants that raised his shares in the firm that has largely generated the magnate’s business fortune. He kept his position as the richest man in the world for only a few days until the price of Tesla shares dropped.

He currently ones more than one fight of Tesla in which he has around 73.5 million options that are valued at approximately about $53 billion.

According to Forbes Tesla, ended the trading day on Monday 27 September with a market cap of more than $792 billion, and SpaceX was valued at $74 billion after the latest funding round in February.

Tesla’s shares spiralled by 720% in 2020 helping to raise Musk’s net worth by more than $125 billion in a year, Forbes earlier reported.