On Friday, Jeff Bezos’s net worth dropped by $15.2 billion, contributing to a widespread loss of $134 billion among the world’s 500 wealthiest individuals, according to Bloomberg.
On the New York Stock Exchange, Amazon.com Inc. shares fell by 8.8%, part of a broader decline in the stock markets, which reduced Bezos’s net worth to $191.5 billion, as reported by Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index. This drop is the third largest loss Bezos has experienced, following a $36 billion decrease on April 4, 2019, due to his divorce settlement, and a 14% drop on April 29, 2022, when Amazon shares fell significantly.
The Nasdaq 100 Index on the New York Stock Exchange declined by 2.4% on Friday, affecting the net worth of other billionaires, including Elon Musk and Larry Ellison (of Oracle Corp), whose net worths dropped by $6.6 billion and $4.4 billion, respectively. Uncertainties regarding potential interest rate cuts by the U.S. Federal Reserve and disappointing financial results have led the Nasdaq Index into correction territory, erasing over $2 trillion in value within just three weeks.
The drop in Amazon’s stock, the most severe since April 2022, follows the company’s announcement of its intention to continue substantial spending on artificial intelligence (AI) at the expense of short-term profits.
Additionally, technology billionaires Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin, and Larry Page each lost over $3 billion on Friday due to declines in Meta Platforms Inc and Alphabet shares on the New York Stock Exchange. Collectively, billionaires in this sector saw their fortunes decrease by $68 billion, according to Bloomberg.
Bezos, 60 years old and the second-richest person in the world, has sold a significant amount of Amazon stock this year. In February, he sold shares worth approximately $8.5 billion. Furthermore, last month, on the day Amazon shares reached a new record high, Bezos announced a plan to sell an additional 25 million shares, valued at $5 billion.
This additional sale will bring the total value of shares sold by Bezos this year to $13.5 billion, according to Bloomberg calculations. After completing the sale, he will retain nearly 912 million shares, or approximately 8.8% of Amazon. His wealth also includes interests in Blue Origin and The Washington Post.