Elon Musk Becomes First Person Ever to Lose $200 Billion

[highplainsdem]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-30/elon-musk-becomes-first-person-ever-to-lose-200-billion

Elon Musk was the second person ever to amass a personal fortune of more than $200 billion, breaching that threshold in January 2021, months after Jeff Bezos.

The Tesla Inc. chief executive officer has now achieved a first of his own: becoming the only person in history to erase $200 billion from their net worth.

Musk, 51, has seen his wealth plummet to $137 billion after Tesla shares tumbled in recent weeks, including an 11% drop on Tuesday, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. His fortune peaked at $340 billion on Nov. 4, 2021, and he remained the world’s richest person until he was overtaken this month by Bernard Arnault, the French tycoon behind luxury-goods powerhouse LVMH.

-snip-

The decline in Tesla shares has been so steep — the shares fell 65% in 2022 — and Musk has sold so much this year to help cover his Twitter purchase, that they’re no longer his biggest asset, according to Bloomberg’s wealth index. Musk’s stake in his closely held Space Exploration Technologies Corp., at $44.8 billion, exceeds his approximately $44 billion position in Tesla stock (he still has options worth an estimated $27.8 billion). Musk now owns 42.2% of SpaceX, according to a recent filing.

-snip-

This Bloomberg piece describes Musk's approach at Twitter as "move fast and break things" which is too kind. Unless what they really meant was "prove incompetence at record speed" - and even that doesn't capture how crazy and self-destructive Musk's mismanagement of Twitter has been.

[Cha]

1. Fuck around and Find out, melonhead.

[TheRealNorth]

6. +1

[republianmushroom]

2. I like it

[central scrutinizer]

3. For too many Americans, losing $200 is a catastrophe

This asshole won’t have to choose between housing and food

[Kid Berwyn]

12. Thank you for putting it in perspective.

Prefer the IRS put Elon’s gains to work before one of his fellow conmen.

[doc03]

4. Won't he be able avoid taxes on $200,000,000 of his future earnings? nt

[thesquanderer]

7. Net worth is not taxed... nor is it a source of tax credits.

IOW, the value of his Tesla stock is not seen as either a gain or a loss... until he sells it. The fact that the stock he is holding is worth less now than it was worth a month ago has no tax relevance, it's a theoretical loss compared to what he might have been able to sell it for, but it is not an actual realized loss. The money he "lost" was not money he ever actually had. (Though the stock could have been used for collateral.)

[doc03]

10. I understand my stocks are down a few thousand on paper but I haven't sold them so no real loss.

[Wounded Bear]

5. Shit, I could have used a couple thou of that money...

[sarge43]

8. Certainly more impressive than bankrupting gambling casinos n/t

[LetMyPeopleVote]

9. Musk is a loser

[Mr. Sparkle]

11. It couldn't happen to a more deserving guy

His maga batshitiness is beyond the pale

[LetMyPeopleVote]

13. 30 dimensional chess in action.

Link to tweet

[LetMyPeopleVote]

14. Let that sink in.

Link to tweet

[former9thward]

15. He has not lost a dime.

If the stocks go up his net worth will go up. All stocks, as measured by the averages, had their worst year since 2008.