Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: Space entrepreneur Elon Musk and nine other world’s richest people added a whopping USD 402.17 billion to their personal net worth in 2021.
In contrast, India’s foreign exchange reserve in 2021 amounted to about USD 635 billion, the media reported on Friday.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Musk alone added USD 121 billion to his net worth this year, becoming the world’s richest man who glimpsed his net worth cross the USD 300 billion mark.
On December 29, 2021, Musk had a net worth of USD 277 billion.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos followed him with a net worth of USD 195 billion, but he could add only USD 5 billion to grab the second spot.
Adding USD 61 billion to his net worth in 2021, Bernard Arnault, CEO of luxury goods conglomerate LVMH, with USD 176 billion, came third.
Philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates became the fourth richest man as he saw his net worth soar to USD 139 billion, adding USD 7 billion.
Google co-founder Larry Page, with USD 130 billion net worth (and adding $47 billion), was the fifth richest person on the planet this year.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg added USD 24 billion to command a net worth of USD 128 billion to be the sixth richest man.
At the seventh place, another Google co-founder Sergey Brin, with USD 125 billion net worth, added $45 billion in 2021.
Steve Ballmer, former Microsoft CEO and owner of the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers, added USD 41 billion to witness his net worth zoom to USD 122 billion.
Cloud major Oracle’s chairperson and founder Larry Ellison with USD 109 billion (and adding USD 29 billion) occupied the ninth spot, while Warren Buffett, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, finished 10th with USD 109 billion net worth and adding USD 21 billion in 2021.