World’s 10 richest tech giants shed $44 billion wealth, Jeff Bezos tops list with $9 billion loss

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos

The world's top 10 richest people lost a collective $44 billion due to equity devaluations amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The world’s richest man Jeff Bezos led the pack, alone shedding $9 billion in wealth as Amazon shares slumped, as per Bloomberg.

Bezos was closely followed by tech mogul Elon Musk, who lost $8.5 billion as company Tesla Inc. shares teased “bear-territory” over a three-day slide, the publication said.

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg lost $4.2 billion, while Microsoft Founder Bill Gates’ wealth lowered by $2.9 billion. Other on the list include Steve Ballmer who lost $4.8 billion, Larry Page lost $3.6 billion, Sergey Brin lost $3.5 billion,  MacKenzie Scott lost $3.2 billion, Larry Ellison lost $2.4 billion, and Jack Ma lost $1.6 billion.

The wealth reversal on September 4 was a surprise as markets had so far stayed afloat despite grim economic realities worldwide. Case in point: both Musk and Zuckerberg posted enormous $4 billion a day wealth gain; while Bezos became the world’s richest person and his ex-wife MacKenzie Scott the world’s richest woman.

Despite this, the world’s wealthiest collectively added $830 billion to their wealth this year, as per the Bloomberg Billionaire Index – with Bezos alone claiming $83 billion gains, followed by Musk with $69 billion gains.