On Friday, October 27, Amazon.com Inc. shares took an upward surge , lifting his net worth by $7.8 billion to top out at $91.8 billion as of 10 a.m. in New York. A 10 percent uptick in shares bought current share costs to $1,007.59. By October 31, shares are selling at $1,104.16.
Bezos moved from second place on the wealth rankings to first. He was behind Bill Gates, Microsoft Corp. co-founder, on July 27 of this year, even though he enjoyed a short time at the top of heap before Amazon shares dipped, leaving Gates the winner at the end of the day.
Thursday, Gates ended the day with a net worth of $88 billion, according to Bloomberg’s index, which tracks the world’s 500 richest people. Gates, 61, has topped the list since 2013.
On Friday, when Bezos appeared headed for top billing on the list, others also saw their wealth grow. Alphabet Inc.’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page added $2 billion in the first 30 minutes of trading, as did Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer. Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook Inc. added $600,000 to his total.
Bezos, 53, has increased his wealth by $18.1 billion this year, while Gates’ net worth rose by $5.6 billion. Gates donated $4.6 billion of Microsoft stock to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in August.
Analysts, looking at his public charity say Gates would be worth $150 billion if he had not donated almost 700 million Microsoft shares and cash and other assets to an amount of $2.9 billion since 1996.