Elon Musk briefly overtaken as world's richest man

Elon Musk has been known as the world’s richest man for some time now, but briefly lost his title on Wednesday (December 7).

The Twitter and Tesla CEO fell behind to Bernard Arnault according to Forbes, before retaking the title just hours later.

Arnault is the chief executive of LVMH, which is the parent company of designer brand Louis Vuitton, and his personal wealth briefly overtook that of Musk.

Arnault is said to be worth $185.4 billion and Musk's fortune fell to $185.3 billion. Forbes calculates the numbers based on stock prices.

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It’s the first time Musk has been knocked off the number one spot since September 2021.

While we’re sure Musk is hardly short for cash at the moment, his net worth has dropped from its peak of around $320 billion in November last year.

Musk and Arnault were neck and neck in the list on WednesdayGetty images

Tesla stock was at its peak back then, and the company’s stock has lost roughly 57 per cent of its worth during 2022.

Arnault’s LVMH on the other hand is faring far better, despite having fallen 9.7 per cent in 2022. LVHM controls Louis Vuitton as well as the likes of Christian Dior, Marc Jacobs, Sephora and Tiffany & Co.

Musk might just be clinging onto the title of world’s richest man at the moment, but he’s definitely not the most popular – and Musk recently revealed there could well be a target on his head.

During a two-hour Q&A on Twitter Spaces, Musk said: “Frankly the risk of something bad happening to me, or even literally being shot, is quite significant.”

He added: “It’s not that hard to kill me if somebody wanted to, so hopefully they don’t and fate smiles upon the situation with me and it does not happen.”

The Tesla boss also defended his “absolutist” stance on free speech, insisting that he just wanted “a future where we’re not oppressed, our speech is not suppressed, and we can say what we want to say without fear of reprisals".

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