Top billionaires Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, both lost billions on Tuesday as Wall Street saw carnage due to a widespread stock market sell-off following the announcement of higher-than-expected US inflation figures.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the overall consumer price index rose 0.1% in August and was 8.3% higher than it was a year earlier. Jeff Bezos lost almost $9.8 billion (roughly Rs 80,000 crore), while Elon Musk’s net worth decreased by $8.4 billion (around Rs 70,000 crore).
According to sources, following the Covid-19 pandemic, all three of the major US stock indices—Dow Jones, S&P, and Nasdaq—fell to record lows after seeing their largest one-day percentage drops since June 2020.
This week, the markets posted four-day winning streaks, which was advantageous for investors.
On Tuesday, the Nasdaq Composite fell 632.84 points, or 5.16%, to 11,633.57, the S&P 500 lost 177.72 points, or 4.32%, to 3,932.69, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1,276.37 points, or 3.94%, to 31,104.97. The 11 main sectors of the S&P 500 ended the session with significant losses.
Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Steve Ballmer, among other prominent billionaires, lost more than $4 billion.
According to the recently disclosed Bloomberg data, well-known investor Warren Buffett and Microsoft founder Bill Gates lost $3.4 billion and $2.8 billion, respectively.
