Tesla owner Elon Musk briefly lost the top spot on Forbes' billionaire list on Wednesday (Dec 7) to Bernard Arnault, whose family owns the world's leading luxury group, LVMH.
With US tech stocks sliding as interest
rates and recession fears rise, Musk's fortune briefly fell below that of the
Arnault family.
But around 1730 GMT Musk was back on top at
US$184.9 billion, followed by Arnault and his family at US$184.7 billion.
Indian businessman Gautam Adani was in
third place at US$134.8 billion, with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos fourth at
US$111.3 billion.
Arnault had also topped the Forbes list for
several hours in 2021.
His LVMH group, with includes dozens of
brands including Louis Vuitton, Givenchy, and Kenzo, has continued to post
strong revenue and profit growth despite the latest global economic headwinds.
Musk's fortune is primarily tied to the
share price of Tesla, and the entrepreneur has been at the centre of
controversy after having taken over Twitter in late October.
The other major wealth ranking compiled by
financial data provider Bloomberg also has Musk and Arnault running nearly
neck-and-neck.
According to Bloomberg's ranking,
calculated after US markets closed on Tuesday, had Musk in the lead at US$178.9
billion, followed by Arnault at US$165.1 billion.