Elon Musk’s wealth peaked in November 2021, reaching $340 billion. He is also the first person in history to have assets exceeding the $300 billion mark. Where does Elon Musk get his income from to become the richest billionaire in the world?
Elon Musk in a meeting at SpaceXElon Musk does not receive a salary at the companies he is working for. If he does, he only receives a symbolic salary of 1 USD/year. In fact, many other billionaires such as Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg… also receive a symbolic salary of 1 USD/year at the companies they work for.Many people believe that this is a “trick” for Elon Musk and the world’s top billionaires to avoid personal income tax.
However, according to economic experts, like many other billionaires, Elon Musk’s wealth comes from many unstable sources, fluctuating continuously because it is based on stock prices instead of real assets. Elon Musk is the first person in history to have a fortune exceeding the 300 billion USD mark, but also the first person in the world to lose 200 billion USD because of stock price decline.
Up to now, according to Forbes’ billionaire rankings, Elon Musk is the richest billionaire in the world with a fortune of 248.8 billion USD, far surpassing the second richest person in the world, “brand name tycoon” Bernard. Arnault’s assets are estimated at 207.1 billion USD.
Elon Musk is the richest billionaire in the world with a fortune of 248.8 billion USDElon Musk was born in 1971 in South Africa, moved to Canada with his mother and studied for a PhD at the prestigious Stanford University, but he dropped out of the program to pursue his career.He started his business very early when, along with his younger brother Kimbal Musk and friend Greg Kouri, he founded Zip2, a company that provides online travel guide software. But then, Zip2 was bought by Compaq computer company for 305 million USD in 1999. Elon Musk received 22 million USD from this deal. That year, Musk was only 28 years old.
In 1999, Elon Musk and his friends Harris Fricker, Christopher Payne and Ed Ho founded X.com – one of the first banks and online transaction services to appear on the internet. To attract users, this service also gives money to subscribers and invites friends to join.
In 2000, X.com merged with competitor Confinity Inc, a software company that developed online payment services. After the merger, the two companies changed their name to Paypal. Two years later, eBay acquired PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) for $1.5 billion. Musk earned $165 million from this deal.
X.com is used for the social network Twitter.Elon Musk was the one who chose the name X.com for the company he founded and purchased the domain name X.com in 1999. This domain name then belonged to eBay, but was acquired by Musk in 2017. Currently, X.com is used for the social network Twitter.In 2004, Elon Musk invested 6.5 million USD and became the largest shareholder of Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA). This is definitely the wisest and most successful investment deal of this billionaire.
In 2008, Musk spent $40 million from his own pocket to help Tesla avoid bankruptcy. He was appointed to the position of CEO of Tesla and has held this position since then. Currently, Elon Musk is still the largest shareholder of this electric car company.
Notably, in the early days when this billionaire invested in Tesla, the company continuously lost money because electric cars were still a “distant dream”. SpaceX also encountered financial difficulties when test rocket launches continuously failed. In 2009, Elon Musk had to rely on personal loans.
But since Tesla officially went public in 2010, Musk’s net worth has increased sharply as Tesla’s stock price has continuously increased. In 2012, Elon Musk first appeared on Forbes’ list of billionaires with an estimated fortune of $2 billion.
Estimated Elon Musk’s assets from January to the end of November 2020Elon Musk’s net worth began to increase sharply during the global pandemic, when Tesla’s stock price spiked. In 2020, Tesla’s stock price increased by 700%. At the beginning of 2020, Musk’s wealth was estimated to reach 30 billion USD, but by the end of the year, Musk’s assets had increased nearly 6 times, reaching 170 billion USD.How big is Elon Musk’s fortune?
Elon Musk became the richest person in the world for the first time in January 2021, when his wealth surpassed $200 billion. Musk’s wealth peaked in November 2021 when it reached $340 billion. Musk is also the first person in history to have assets exceeding the $300 billion mark.
According to calculations, if Elon Musk spent 1 million USD every day, it would take him 673 years to spend all his current assets. This number is 6 times the average human lifespan. But with current spending, the actual time may be longer than that.
Elon Musk does not tend to spend money on luxuries, but instead, he lets “money make money” by continuously investing.
He used to own expensive real estate but later sold them to invest. He currently lives in a compact prefabricated house called Boxabl Casita, the price of which is only equivalent to a Mercedes-Benz C-Class (according to the selling price in the US).
Tesla’s erratic ups and downs affect l
