REVEALED: Top 10 richest people in the world in 2024, and nine are Americans

When Forbes released its annual list of the richest people in the world earlier in 2024, it noted that the number of billionaires had climbed to its highest ever at 2,781. Cut to the end of the year and it is quite clear that the number of billionaires in 2025 will rise even further. A snapshot of what is to come can be seen from the impeccable rise in the fortunes of the 10 richest billionaires in the world as of December 2024, most particularly Elon Musk.

It is worth noting that while the first half of the year may not have been outstanding for most, the latter half turned out to be remarkably different, particularly due to the outcome of the US Presidential elections.

As Donald Trump emerged victorious on 5 November, the world’s 10 richest billionaires added a massive USD 64 billion in a single day to their cumulative net worth. The biggest gainer was, of course, Elon Musk, who added USD 26.5 billion following Trump’s win.

While a handful, maybe one or two at most, of the 10 richest billionaires might see their net worth fall over the next few weeks due to volatility in the markets owing to a series of political factors in the world, most of them will remain on the list.

It is also not a surprise that nine of the top 10 billionaires of 2024 are from the United States. The US is like a modern-day Roman empire, where wealth creation – by any means necessary – is the cornerstone of its societal and governmental policies, and, therefore, the foundation upon which it stands. This is why they had a record 813 billionaires earlier in the year, as Forbes data revealed. (Though Hurun Global Rich List 2024, released around the same time, suggested China has more.) Obviously, that number will go up in the 2025 list.

It is also noteworthy that most American billionaires are now richer than they were a year prior, irrespective of issues such as inflation, wars and political unrest affecting almost all of the world in 2024. Whether anyone likes it or not, the re-election of Trump has strongly boosted the confidence of investors in the US markets at least for the time being. There are clear indications that the mega businesses of the US, especially the semiconductor and broader tech enterprises with focus on artificial intelligence (AI), may see themselves expand massively.

(Note: Data on net worth, age, nationality and source from Forbes Real-Time Billionaires chart as of 17 December 2024.)

Here are the world’s 10 richest billionaires of 2024

Michael Dell

Net worth: Around USD 121 billion

Age: 59

Nationality: United States

The chairman and CEO of Dell Technologies has doubled his net worth since 2023. Dell founded his namesake computer company in 1984. The world-renowned company is one of the leading manufacturers of personal computers. In 2016, Dell acquired computer storage giant EMC to become Dell Technologies. Thus, Dell and Dell EMC are subsidiaries of Dell Technologies.

According to a 2023 Forbes report Michael Dell holds a 50 per cent stake in Dell Technologies. He also has a 40 per cent stake in American cloud computing company VMware and has a private investment firm, DFO Management. At the time, around 75 per cent of his then USD 66 billion net worth came from his shares in Dell and VMware. In November 2023, American semiconductor maker Broadcom acquired VMware for USD 69 billion. Michael Dell received cash and shares in Broadcom in exchange for his stake in VMware.

That deal is the reason why he became one of the top 10 wealthiest billionaires in mid-December of 2024. Dell owns 210 million shares in Broadcom. The value of his holdings rose as the company’s stocks skyrocketed and its market cap crossed USD 1 trillion.

Steve Ballmer

Net worth: Around USD 131 billion

Source: Microsoft

Age: 68

Nationality: United States

His net worth may go north or south, but nothing will take away the fact that Steve Ballmer has achieved something rare in the world of business in 2024 — surpassing the wealth of a founder of the very company in which he worked as an employee.

In June 2024, Ballmer became the sixth-richest person in the world with a net worth of USD 157 billion. He is still the only person in the world with a net worth of more than USD 100 billion who has earned his fortune as an employee and not as a founder. By comparison, Bill Gates, who co-founded Microsoft, has a net worth of USD 108 billion and is ranked 14th on Forbes‘ real-time billionaires as of 9 December 2024.

Ballmer, the employee No.30 of Microsoft, holds roughly 4 per cent stocks in the company, which is the world’s third-biggest by market cap with an estimated worth of USD 3.2 trillion. He succeeded Gates as Microsoft’s CEO in 2000 and remained in the position till in 2014. The same year he bought the National Basketball Association (NBA) team Los Angeles Clippers for USD 2 billion. The team is now worth an estimated USD 5.5 billion.

Warren Buffett

Net worth: Around USD 142 billion

Age: 94

Nationality: United States

The “Oracle of Omaha”, Warren Buffett is the oldest billionaire among the top 10 richest people in the world by net worth. Buffett is a kind of a czar among stock market enthusiasts; investors keep a keen eye on what the nonagenarian is trading in, as it can give them clear indications as to what may or may not perform in the long run.

For three straight quarters in 2024, Buffett, through his holding company Berkshire Hathaway, maintained a steady retreat from the stock markets. By early November 2024, Berkshire Hathaway had around USD 325 billion in cash. Yet Buffett’s net worth rose by more than USD 8 billion on the back of Berkshire Hathaway’s A share stock price rising by around 7 per cent in November.

A September 2024 Forbes report gives greater insight into Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio. According to it, its five biggest investments include Apple, American Express Company, Bank of America, Coca-Cola and Chevron. Berkshire Hathaway also wholly owns several prominent companies. Among them are insurance company GEICO, freight railroad company BNSF Railway, battery maker Duracell and fast-food chain Dairy Queen.

Buffett is one of the world’s most famous philanthropists. He has promised to give away 99 per cent of his wealth and has donated around USD 60 billion to date, much of which has been through the foundations of his children and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Sergey Brin

Net worth: Around USD 154.5 billion

Age: 51

Nationality: United States

Sergey Brin, the son of a mathematician father, escaped the Soviet Union at the age of six with his family. He met Larry Page while pursuing a doctorate at Stanford University. Soon the two friends dropped out and founded a search engine named Google from a friend’s garage in 1998. The rest is perhaps the greatest story in the world of technology.

The company went public in 2004 and is now a subsidiary of Alphabet — a holding company created by Brin and Page in 2015. Alphabet is the fifth biggest in the world with a market cap of over USD 2.1 trillion. YouTube is also part of Alphabet as it was acquired by Google in 2006. Advertisement company DoubleClick, AI company Deepmind, wearable fitness device maker Fitbit and satellite navigation provider Waze are among Alphabet’s key acquisitions.

Brin served as the president of Alphabet till 2019. He has a controlling stake in the company. According to Nasdaq, Brin and Page own a 6 per cent stake in the company. This means that Brin has a share of 3 per cent.

Brin also has investments in other companies. A notable one was electric car maker Tesla, in which he invested in 2006 — two years before Elon Musk became its CEO. In 2021, reports said that he had sold all of his Tesla shares for USD 366 million. He has also invested around USD 250 million into his aerospace research company LTA Research, which is building high-tech airships.

Larry Page

Net worth: Around USD 162 billion

Age: 51

Nationality: United States

The other half of the Google co-founder duo, Larry Page stepped down as CEO of Alphabet in 2019 but remains on its board and is a controlling shareholder. His fortune almost doubled through 2020 and 2021, quite like several other top 10 billionaires at the time, during the pandemic. Like Brin, Page owns around 3 per cent of Alphabet.

Bernard Arnault & family

Net worth: USD 171 billion

Age: 75

Nationality: France

The only non-American among the 10 richest people, Bernard Arnault was the richest person in the world in Forbes’ annual billionaires list in 2023 and 2024. He had a net worth of USD 233 billion in the latter list. But the chairman and CEO of French luxury goods giant LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, who until March 2024 held on to his place, has since seen his net worth fall by several billions.

Weaker sales in China resulted in the conglomerate’s stock prices tanking by 20 per cent in six months. Fortune reported in September 2024 that the drop in stock price resulted in Arnault finding his net worth slashed by USD 54 billion. According to Forbes’ estimates, he lost USD 9 billion in November alone as shares of LVMH fell by 6 per cent.

Arnault owns around 48 per cent of LVMH. His holding company, Agache, controls Financière Agache. They back Aglaé Ventures, a venture capital firm which has investments in Netflix (whose co-founder, Reed Hastings, is also a billionaire) as well as TikTok’s parent ByteDance. In November 2024, Agache became a majority shareholder of the Ligue 2 football team Paris FC with a stake of 52.4 per cent.

With LVMH, Arnault also has a 40 per cent stake in private equity firm L Catterton. The firm, which was founded in 1989, has under its management USD 34 billion worth of assets around the world. Among its investments in Asia are China’s Trendy International Group, India’s PVR Cinemas, Singapore’s Charles & Keith, and South Korean luxury eyewear major Gentle Monster whose client list includes entertainment icons such as Beyoncé, Rihanna, Kendrick Lamar, Billie Eilish, and Jennie of BLACKPINK.

Mark Zuckerberg

Net worth: USD 216 billion

Age: 40

Nationality: United States

The youngest billionaire among the top 10 of 2024, Mark Zuckerberg leads the world’s largest social media company as its CEO. The story of how he co-founded Facebook (now Meta Platforms) as a 19-year-old student of Harvard University in 2004 has been retold umpteen times and recounted in the biographical movie The Social Network (2010).

Musk, who currently owns around 13 per cent of his company’s stocks, first entered the top 10 on Forbes billionaires list in 2016 with a net worth of USD 44.6 billion. He has been among the top 10 in all successive years barring 2022 and 2023. Between 2023 and 2024, his net worth increased by more than USD 112 billion, returning him among the top 10 in Forbes’ 2024 list.

In October 2024, he entered the exclusive list of billionaires with a net worth of more than USD 200 billion — the first time that Forbes had four people with a similar or higher net worth. He is now worth more, which means Zuckerberg will certainly be among the 10 richest billionaires in the world when Forbes releases its 2025 list.

Larry Ellison

Net worth: Around 217 billion

Age: 80

Nationality: United States

While the meteoric rise in the net worth of Jensen Huang has been the talk of the town since 2023, the one who perhaps went under the radar despite the phenomenal gains he made is Larry Ellison.

Until 2020, Ellison, the chairman, chief technology officer and co-founder of software giant Oracle, was far from any top 10 richest persons list. At the time his fortune was somewhere around USD 60 billion. But today, it is more than 280 per cent what it was just over four years ago. In fact, Ellison and Bezos have been engaged in a close contest for the No.2 spot among the world’s richest persons for quite some time in 2024, till as recently as 1 December, when the former was behind only Musk.

So, how did Ellison manage this astonishing rise and end up becoming one of the 10 richest billionaires of 2024? The short answer is AI. Oracle is now a major driver of the AI boom and has partnered with Huang’s NVIDIA in key areas. Oracle is also a major player in cloud computing and services. Its stocks have risen by as much as 64 per cent in 2024 alone. This directly increases Ellison’s net worth, since he owns 40 per cent of the company.

Ellison also owns somewhere around 1.4 per cent of Tesla stocks. He was on the board of the electric car major from 2018 till August 2022, the period after which his shareholding information has not been disclosed.

Jeff Bezos

Net worth: Around USD 246 billion

Age: 60

Nationality: United States

The chairman of Amazon, Jeff Bezos gained around USD 19 billion in November due to an 11 per cent rise in the shares of his e-commerce behemoth. Unlike Musk, however, Bezos has seen more stability in his fortune in the long run.

Forbes notes that Bezos’ director to The Washington Post, the prestigious media house he owns, not to endorse a presidential candidate ahead of the 2024 US Presidential elections led to a loss of “a couple hundred thousand subscribers”. But the loss is insignificant to Bezos as The Washington Post itself has been struggling financially for months, according to multiple media reports.

At the time of his divorce with ex-wife MacKenzie Scott, he retained 12 per cent of Amazon’s shares and she got 4 per cent. Today, he holds 10 per cent of Amazon.

Bezos was the world’s richest person for four consecutive years on Forbes’ list of the world’s billionaires from 2018 through 2021. He was the third richest person in Forbes’ 2024 list and seems to be ready to become the second-richest in the 2025 list. However, as of the end of December, the gap in the wealth between him and the richest man, Musk, is more than USD 200 billion. That’s a titanic difference because the figure alone is more than the net worth of anyone after Zuckerberg, the fourth-richest person.

Elon Musk

Net worth: Around USD 454.5 billion

Age: 53

Nationality: United States

Elon Musk was undoubtedly the biggest gainer in the business world when Donald Trump won a decisive mandate in the 2024 US Presidential elections. In fact, it needs no ‘analysis’ to underline the gains Musk made after the results showed Trump securing his place as the 47th President of the US.

Musk has always been very vocal about his support for the Republican leader and donated somewhere between USD 100 million to USD 260 million to the Trump campaign. Now, he has been named the co-head of an advisory group Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) along with Vivek Ramaswamy.

As for his wealth, his fortune saw a rise of 25 per cent in November alone and crossed USD 300 billion for the first time in two years. Forbes estimates that his net worth increased by USD 66 billion between 1 November and 1 December. This is the clearest indicator of the significance of Trump’s victory on Musk’s fortune.

Musk was the world’s richest person in 2023 and will end 2024 as the richest of all billionaires. He had lost his spot briefly between January and May 2024, but xAI’s valuation over the next few months helped him back up. The South African-origin tech genius owns 54 per cent of the USD 50 billion company, according to Forbes. His primary source of wealth is Tesla, in which he holds a 13 per cent stake. Apart from Tesla and xAI, the major companies owned by Musk include SpaceX, The Boring Company, Tesla Energy and Neuralink.

As of 9 December 2024, he had a net worth of USD 355 billion. By 11 December, just about two days later, he became the first person in history to clock a net worth of USD 400 billion largely due to a jump in SpaceX’s valuation to around USD 350 billion. To put this into perspective, Musk’s net worth is more than the nominal GDPs of several Asian and European economic powerhouses and oil-rich Gulf countries, including Malaysia, Hong Kong, Denmark, Finland, Qatar and Kuwait.

Source: www.lifestyleasia.com