Jeff Bezos Becomes World's Second Richest Person Will he eventually unseat Bill Gates and take the top spot?
By Matthew Humphries •
This story originally appeared on PCMag
Ask anyone who the world's richest person is and chances are they'll know it's Bill Gates. He's held the top spot for 18 of the past 23 years, and that doesn't look like it will change for the foreseeable future. However, below Gates the rankings have changed, and another giant of the tech industry moved into second place this week.
According to Bloomberg, Amazon founder and pilot of giant mecha Jeff Bezos unseated Warren Buffett on Wednesday and moved into second place. The reason is Amazon's share price rising to $18.32, which added $1.5 billion to Bezos's fortune, taking his total to $75.6 billion. Buffett currently sits at $74.9 billion. That's close enough for the positions to switch again, but Buffett has lost a few billion recently while Bezos continues to rise, adding $10.2 billion to his worth this year alone.
Bezos is now "only" $10.4 billion behind Bill Gates, so the next question to ask is, will he eventually unseat Gates?
Amazon's share price is rising and according to CNN Money analysts recommend buying it. We also can't overlook Bezos's interest in space through his company Blue Origin, which hopes to offer space tourism using a reusable rocket, and plans a delivery service into space. Just this week, we got a look inside Blue Origin's passenger capsule, and his ambitious plans include moon deliveries by 2020.
Bezos is also a savvy investor, spending $250,000 on Google stock (3.3 million shares) back in 1998, which is now worth around $2.8 billion.
With Bill Gates now focused on philanthropy while Bezos is still building his business empire, combined with the fact Gates is 61 and Bezos is only 53, it seems likely the switch will happen eventually. Unless of course Bezos starts making some very poor business decisions or decides to leave it all behind and go relax on a tropical island somewhere.
