Lee Jae-yong Ranks 331st... "Net Assets Decrease by 2 Trillion Won" Amid Samsung Electronics' Slump
The net worth of Elon Musk, the world's richest person and CEO, doubled over the course of 2024. Meanwhile, the assets of Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong decreased by nearly 2 trillion won.
The combined net worth of the world's top 500 billionaires was estimated to approach $10 trillion (approximately 1,470 trillion won).
According to the billionaire index released by Bloomberg on the 1st, the total net worth of the world's top 500 billionaires reached $9.8 trillion (about 1,442.3 trillion won) as of the previous day. This is roughly equivalent to the GDP of Germany, Japan, and Australia in 2023, and the increase in net worth compared to the previous year was $1.5 trillion (about 220 trillion won).
Notably, the net worth increase of eight leaders of U.S. technology companies accounted for 43% of the total. This was due to capital flowing into the U.S. fueled by the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. Additionally, the assets of the so-called 'Magnificent 7' tech companies grew significantly, with the combined net worth of eight U.S.-based tech CEOs making up 43% of the total.
During the U.S. presidential campaign period, President-elect Donald Trump and Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla. Photo by AFP Yonhap News
The richest person was Musk. His net worth reached $432 billion (about 635 trillion won), more than double the $203 billion at the end of 2023. Second place was Amazon founder Jeff Bezos with a net worth of $239 billion (about 351 trillion won). Bloomberg explained that the gap between first and second place was the largest ever recorded. Third place was Meta Platforms (Facebook's parent company) CEO Mark Zuckerberg ($207 billion, about 304 trillion won), and fourth was Larry Ellison, chairman of Oracle ($192 billion, about 282 trillion won).
Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, a major beneficiary of the AI boom, saw his net worth increase by $70.3 billion (about 10.3 trillion won) over the year to $114 billion (about 167 trillion won), ranking him 12th.
Bloomberg named Donald Trump, the U.S. president-elect, as a winner. The stock price of Truth Social, the social networking service company founded by Trump, surged, doubling his net worth to $6.47 billion (about 9.5 trillion won) over the year. He ranked 471st in net worth.
Conversely, Bernard Arnault, chairman of Louis Vuitton Mo?t Hennessy (LVMH), saw the largest decrease in assets among the top 500 billionaires. His net worth dropped by $31.2 billion (about 4.59 trillion won) over one year to $176 billion (about 259 trillion won). Arnault, once the world's richest person, ranked 5th.
Among domestic businesspeople, Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong and Meritz Financial Group Chairman Cho Jung-ho were included in the top 500 billionaires. Despite Samsung Electronics, the top domestic company by market capitalization, experiencing a 32.23% stock price decline over the year, Lee's net worth decreased by 14.4%, or $1.42 billion (about 2 trillion won), according to Bloomberg's calculations. Chairman Cho's assets increased by $2.42 billion (about 3.5 trillion won).
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