United States: Mr. Elon Musk has lost the title of the richest man in the world following significant declines in the value of shares in his electric vehicle firm Tesla.
“Musk had lost the top spot to France’s Bernard Arnault, the chief executive of the luxury group LVMH,” as per the report.
The South Africa-born Tesla’s CEO and top shareholder recently acquired ownership of Twitter. Since Mr. Musk’s initial bid for Twitter in April, the electric car manufacturer has seen its market value drop by more than 50 percent.
The day before Twitter reported in a securities filing that the billionaire had made a hostile bid worth $43.4 billion, shares of Tesla were traded at $340.79. The price of a Tesla share has dropped more than 50 percent since then, and it is currently trading at roughly $160.
According to the statement, fresh falls in the car company’s share price at the start of the week wiped about $7 billion off Mr. Musk’s fortune. It calculates that he is now worth about $177 billion, compared with Mr. Arnault’s net worth of $188 billion.
Mr. Arnault briefly overtook Mr. Musk last week before the Tesla CEO reclaimed the top spot because of share price changes. The luxury car owner has sold approximately $20 billion worth of Tesla stock to pay for his acquisition of Twitter.
Tesla’s market value has been under pressure partly because of the company’s disappointing quarterly results and worries about potential disruptions at one of its factories in Shanghai. Investors are concerned that Musk may get preoccupied with his other ventures, such as controlling Twitter and the rocket company SpaceX. In addition, he frequently draws flak for some of the contentious tweets he sends to his 121 million followers.