Elon Musk Drops To Second Spot After Tesla Loses $15 billion

Tesla chief executive officer Elon Musk recently tweeted that Bitcoin and Ethereum are valued way higher than they should be. The prices of Bitcoin and Ether “do seem high” were his words exactly.

His tweet coincided, or should we say, led to the biggest one-day loss for Tesla since September 2020. Elon Musk couldn’t have thought that a single tweet about Bitcoin price may cost his company $15 billion.  Well, now he knows.

For weeks, the Tesla boss maintained the top spot as the world’s richest man before slipping to second and gaining ground again. However, according to a recent Bloomberg’s review, he has dropped again, falling behind Amazon owner Jeff Bezos to the second spot.

Just last month, he was cruising at the top spot with a $210 billion net worth. Musk now has a net worth of $183.4 billion as Tesla’s shares fell by 8.6% on Monday.

On the other hand, his billionaire mate Bezos has a net worth of $186 billion. Two weeks ago, Tesla was in the news after it announced a $1.5 billion investment in Bitcoin.

Earlier on Tuesday, Bitcoin fell to $48.071, which is a 12.5% fall from its closing price on Monday. This having after series of volatility showed doubts about the viability and durability of the token’s compelling rally.

The largest cryptocurrency in the world by market capitalization has surged by more than 400% over the past year.

Limited availability for Tesla Model Y SUV

Musk also revealed via his favored Twitter handle that Tesla’s Model Y Standard Range SUV will only be available “off the menu”. This is in response to the reports carried by news site Electrec that Tesla has removed the model from its online configurator.

Even after Bezos’s fortune fell by $3.7 million on Monday, he still took the first position, considering the massive shedding of Musk’s wealth.

The two billionaires have been in a tight race, with each of them swapping places more than once this year.

Musk overtook Bezos after rocket company SpaceX, another firm owned by Musk, raised $850 million earlier this month. Bezos has been occupying the top spot for three straight years before Tesla’s recent price rally to 794%, eclipsing the e-commerce titan.

Market selloff shrinks billionaires’’ balance sheet

The Monday market selloff affected many of the wealthiest people in the world. However, the richest person in Asia Zhong Shanshan was one of the worst-hit. His bottled-water company fell by 4.5% shedding about $5.1 billion in the process.

Pony Ma of Tencent Holdings Ltd, Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Industries Ltd, and Colin Huang of Piduoduo Inc were all impacted as they lost by more than $2.5 billion each.

But the fact that Tesla lost more billions than these companies means his Tweet about Bitcoin also contributed to his company’s loss. Another trigger for the decline was Musk’s “off the menu” tweet about the Model Y Range SUV. He even added that the company decided because it doesn’t meet Tesla’s “Standard of Excellence.”