Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has become the world’s richest man, overtaking Microsoft founder Bill Gates.
Asurge in Amazon’s share prices saw Bezos’ fortune climb to over $90 billion, taking him past Gates, who had held the top position since May 2013.
Shares of the online retailer rose 1.8 per cent in New York. If the gains hold till the close, Bezos, 53, could leapfrog Gates on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
“Amazon Prime is why so much physical retail is going away,” said Michael Pachter, a Wedbush Securities analyst. “Anyone who joins Prime shops in retail stores 10 per cent less, and that number will keep accelerating as Amazon adds more inventory.”
Investors also monitor Amazon’s cloudcomputing division, Amazon Web Services, a fast-growing and profitable business that accounts for about 10 per cent of revenue. Amazon leads the cloud computing industry, but faces increasing competition from the likes of Microsoft and Google parent Alphabet.
Amazon is expected to post quarterly revenue of $37.2 billion, a 22 per cent jump from a year earlier, according to analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Bezos owns about 17 per cent of Seattlebased Amazon, which has surged 40 per cent this year, helping to add $24.5 billion to his net worth.
He started 2017 as the world’s fourthwealthiest person and has since leapfrogged Inditex founder Amancio Ortega, who ranks third with $82.7 billion, and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett, No. 4, at $74.5 billion. Gates’ net worth stands at $90.7 billion. MM
World’s Top 10 Richest People
1. Jeff Bezos (Amazon) $90.9B
2.Bill Gates (Microsoft) $90.7B
3. Amancio Ortega (Inditex/Zara) $82.7B
4.Warren Buffett(BerkshireHathaway)$74.5B
5.Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) $70.5B
6.Carlos Slim (Grupo Carso) $66.3B
7. Larry Ellison (Oracle) $52.9B
8.Bernard Arnault (LVMH) $52.4B
9.Larry Page (Google) $48.0B
10.Charles Koch (Koch Industries) $47.5B
SOURCE: BLOOMBERG BILLIONAIRE INDEX
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