French businessman and investor Bernard Arnault retained his position as the world’s richest man on Forbes’ billionaires list this year, increasing his lead on social media and ecommerce behemoths Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg.
Elon Musk, once the richest person in the world, is No. 2 on the list, with a net worth of $195 billion. Musk, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX, also bought Twitter for $44 million in 2022, renaming it X.
Coming in at No. 3 is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who has a net worth of $195 billion. Then comes Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, who is worth $177 billion.
There are 141 more billionaires in the world than last year, with 2,781 in total. Their combined worth equals $14.2 trillion – up by $2 trillion in 2023.
The 2024 list also broke records set in 2021, with 26 more billionaires on the list and their combined net worth up by $1.1 trillion.
Billionaires themselves are also wealthier, with two-thirds adding to their worths. The top 20 on the list gained the most, adding $700 billion to their combined worth since 2023. And the U.S. has a record 813 billionaires – the most of any country.
China has 473 billionaires and India has 200, which set a record for that country.
