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How Elon Musk Actually Became the Richest Man in the World - YouTube
Channel: The Infographics Show
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To the surprise of absolutely no one, online
retail giant Amazon has positively thrived
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during the recent pandemic, making its owner,
multi-billionaire Jeff Bezos, even more wealthy
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than ever before - and he was plenty rich
before the pandemic hit.
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And yet, despite recording-breaking success
for Amazon in 2020, by early January 2021
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Bezos had been shockingly ousted from the
top spot on the Forbes List of the worldâs
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richest people, and the financial world was
shocked by how Elon Musk became the richest
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person in the world.
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Elon Muskâs climb to the top is a fascinating
story because it might just be the fastest
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rise in wealth creation in all of history.
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In March 2020, less than 1 year before he
was crowned The Worldâs Richest, Musk had
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a net worth of only $27 billion dollars, and
had just barely cracked Bloombergâs list
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of the worldâs 50 richest people.
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In just 9 short months, Musk added more than
$165 billion dollars to his net worth to claim
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the top spot among the worldâs richest billionaires.
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By November 2020, Musk had climbed his way
into the top 5 richest people in the world,
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and thatâs when his rise to the top started
in earnest.
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Within a month, Musk overtook both Facebook
creator Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoftâs
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Bill Gates to become the 3rd richest person
in the world.
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In December 2020, he passed French tycoon
Bernard Arnault to take the #2 spot.
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That left Musk behind only Jeff Bezos and
Amazon, who were seemingly untouchable coming
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off of a record year in 2020 thanks to a surge
in business generated by the pandemic.
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But, to the shock of the financial world,
Musk did the impossible - in early January
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2021, Muskâs net worth surged to $190 billion
dollars, nearly $5 billion ahead of Bezos.
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How did he do it?
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How did Elon Musk rise through the ranks of
the worldâs billionaires and tycoons to
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become the worldâs richest person in less
than a year?
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Well, that might be best illustrated by his
own response to the news that he had hit #1.
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Musk replied to a Tweet that announced his
ascension to the #1 spot, saying simply, âHow
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strange.
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Well, back to work.â
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Indeed, hard work has been the key to Muskâs
impressive success.
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While his rise to the top may have seemed
to happen overnight, the truth is that Musk
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has been working towards this moment his entire
life, putting his heart and soul into every
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project he undertakes.
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Muskâs electric car company, Tesla, was
launched in 2003, but only turned its first
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profit in 2020.
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In 2018, when Tesla was plagued by production
delays, Musk told reporters that he was âback
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to sleeping at the factoryâ, dedicating
his every waking hour to getting things back
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on track.
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Without that kind of intense focus and work
ethic, Musk would never have been able to
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rise through the ranks of the worldâs wealthiest.
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Of course, such an incredible and rapid rise
to the top of the worldâs wealthiest people
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doesnât come without controversy.
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Musk has been accused of being complicit in
the deaths of child laborers in the Democratic
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Republic of Congo, where children are forced
to work in brutal conditions to mine cobalt,
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a valuable and essential material required
for manufacturing computers.
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Tesla workers have also spoken out against
Muskâs hardline stance against unions, claiming
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that any pro-union activities within his factories
are swiftly shut down.
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Hard work may be Muskâs secret to success,
but that success hasnât come without a healthy
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dose of ruthlessness and controversy, too.
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Itâs an inescapable economic truth that
youâll never truly get wealthy by working
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for someone else.
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Entrepreneurship is the only path to becoming
one of the worldâs richest people.
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Every billionaire that Musk passed on his
way to the top - from Bill Gates to Mark Zuckerberg,
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Warren Buffett to even Jeff Bezos - every
one of them got where they are by building
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extremely profitable and scalable businesses,
and Elon Musk is no exception.
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Innovation and entrepreneurship seem to be
in Elon Muskâs DNA - though being born into
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a wealthy South African family certainly didnât
hurt.
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He first discovered his love of computers
and technology at the age of 10, and, after
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teaching himself to code, launched his business
career at age 12 when he sold his first software,
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a computer game called Blastar.
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At 17 he moved to Canada to attend Queens
University - and to avoid the mandatory military
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service in his home country of South Africa.
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As his mother was Canadian, Musk obtained
his Canadian citizenship that same year, but
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he already had his sights on the future - he
figured Canadian citizenship would be a stepping
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stone to his ultimate goal - U.S. citizenship.
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3 years later, Musk fulfilled his dream and
moved to the U.S. to attend the University
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of Pennsylvania, where he earned 2 bachelorâs
degrees in economics and physics.
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His next stop was the prestigious Stanford
University, where he enrolled in the PhD program
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in energy physics, but the boy genius would
last just 2 days at Stanford before dropping
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out.
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His arrival in California had coincided with
the internet boom, and Musk and his brother
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Kimbal took a huge gamble, leaving behind
the world of higher education and launching
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their first start-up company, online city
directory Zip2.
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Muskâs gamble paid off - big time.
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Through hard work and tireless effort, Musk
had built a hugely popular and profitable
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business, and in 1999, Musk sold Zip2 to Compaq
for the astonishing price of $307 million
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dollars, plus more than $30 million in stock
options.
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But rather than sit back and enjoy his success,
Musk showed the first glimpses of the uncanny
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business acumen that would later help him
climb the list of the worldâs wealthiest
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people.
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He immediately turned around and invested
the proceeds from the sale of his first company
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to fund his next venture, X.com - an online
payment platform that would later become PayPal.
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2002 was a banner year for Musk - he fulfilled
one of his lifeâs goals when he became a
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U.S. citizen, and he also earned his first
billion at age 30 when he sold PayPal to eBay
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for $1.5 billion dollars.
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But Musk was not done - far from it.
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Finally, he had the money to go after his
true, lifelong dream.
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As Musk explains in a tweet pinned to the
top of his Twitter profile: âAbout half
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my money is intended to help problems on Earth,
and half to help establish a self-sustaining
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city on Mars to ensure continuation of life
(of all species) in case Earth gets hit by
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a meteor like the dinosaurs or WW3 happens
and we destroy ourselves.â
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The sincerity of Muskâs desire to solve
the worldâs problems may be dubious at best
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- the billionaire has been accused of hoarding
his wealth rather than using it to make a
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tangible difference in the world - but with
that ambitious goal in mind, and the proceeds
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of his latest sale in his pocket, Musk went
on to launch 2 companies that certainly changed
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the world as we know it, and would eventually
propel him to the top of the list of the worldâs
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richest people.
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Musk created SpaceX in 2003 to build spacecraft
for commercial travel.
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It may have been a far-fetched dream at the
time, but by 2008, he had successfully secured
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contracts with NASA to supply cargo to the
International Space Station.
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In 2012, he made history when SpaceX launched
the first unmanned Falcon 9 rocket on a resupply
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mission to the ISS, marking the first time
that a private company had sent a spacecraft
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to the space station.
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Musk eventually plans to use SpaceX to shuttle
astronauts to the ISS, as NASA moves away
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from using its own craft, but his focus is
always on the ultimate long-term goal of colonizing
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Mars.
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Space X may be a revolutionary success story,
but the real secret to Muskâs success, at
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least as far as his position of richest person
in the world is concerned, is Tesla.
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Musk also launched Tesla in 2003 using funds
from the PayPal sale, and at the time, his
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ambitions for the electric car company seemed
as outrageous as his plans to colonize Mars.
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Musk wanted to take on the giants of the auto
industry with affordable, mass-market electric
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cars, an idea that seemed ludacris in the
early 2000s.
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Against all odds, Muskâs hard work once
again paid off, and Teslaâs surprising success
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paved the way for Musk to enter the exclusive
realm of the worldâs richest and wealthiest
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people.
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By 2017, Tesla had overtaken General Motors
to become the most valuable car maker in the
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U.S., and Teslaâs all-electric sports car,
the Roadster, is set to be one of the fastest
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production cars ever made.
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But things really kicked up a notch in 2020,
pushing Musk over the edge to become the worldâs
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wealthiest person.
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Teslaâs share price skyrocketed in 2020,
increasing by a staggering 720% in that year
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alone.
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In the first weeks of 2021, the stock climbed
another 20%, giving Musk the final push he
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needed to crack the top spot on the list of
the worldâs richest.
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Tesla is now valued at more than $700 billion
dollars - more than Toyota, Volskwagen, Hyundai,
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General Motors and Ford combined.
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Muskâs unmatched work ethic and his forward
thinking - as well as his ruthlessness - have
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certainly played a key role in the rise of
Tesla stock, but Musk was helped along in
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his journey to becoming the richest person
in the world by some factors that were entirely
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outside of his control.
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For one thing, despite Muskâs surprising
ties to Trump early in his presidency, the
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recent U.S. election results may have prompted
renewed faith in the future of the electric
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car industry in general, as Democrats are
generally seen as more friendly to green agendas
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with things like tax credits for consumers
who buy electric vehicles.
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Surprisingly, the pandemic might also have
helped Tesla and Musk reach new heights.
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According to The Institute for Policy Studies,
the 500 richest people in the world increased
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their combined wealth by a stunning $1.8 trillion
dollars in 2020, and the U.S.âs 651 home-grown
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billionaires alone grew their wealth by more
than $1 trillion dollars over just 9 months.
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Itâs clear that the pandemic provided a
hefty boost to all of the ultra-rich, but
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perhaps none so much as Amazonâs Jeff Bezos.
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Still, despite a record-shattering year for
Amazon in 2020, some key events in the life
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of CEO Jeff Bezos played a huge role in allowing
Elon Musk to bypass him to become the worldâs
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richest person.
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Not only did Bezos lose some of his stake
in Amazon in his divorce settlement, handing
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over 4% of his shares to ex-wife MacKenzie
Scott, but he also donated shares worth more
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than $680 million dollars through his Bezos
Earth Fund in November of 2020.
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These losses added up to a big drop in Bezosâ
net worth, and might have been as much to
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blame for Musk passing Bezos in the list of
the worldsâ richest people as anything Musk
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himself did.
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By the way, how does the richest person in
the world spend their money?
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Probably not the way weâd expectâŠ
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When Musk first started his climb up the ladder
of the worldâs richest people, he certainly
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went on a buying spree, snapping up over $100
million dollars worth of prime California
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real estate, including a $17 million dollar,
1.67 acre estate complete with a 2 story library,
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a private gym, a personal home theatre and
a 1,000-bottle wine cellar.
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However, in 2020 Musk started to sell off
his properties, telling reporters that he
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planned to eventually âown no homeâ.
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And itâs not just real estate that the billionaire
plans to get rid off - in 2012 Musk signed
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The Giving Pledge, vowing to give away and
donate the majority of his wealth during his
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lifetime, though heâs yet to live up to
this promise.
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As the head of one of the worldâs most innovative
auto companies, perhaps itâs not surprising
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that Musk has an affinity for cars.
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He purchased the Lotus Esprit submarine car
from a James Bond movie at auction for $920,000
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dollars, and he also owns a Ford Model T and
a Jaguar E-Type Series 1 Roadster - both gas-powered.
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But other than a taste for fine cars, Musk
insists that he is simply too busy to live
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a lavish lifestyle.
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He has told reporters that he frequently works
120 hour weeks, and that heâs only taken
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a total of 2 weeks off in the 12 years since
he founded Tesla.
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He even spent his 48th birthday in 2019 at
Tesla, working on âglobal logisticsâ for
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the company.
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Musk definitely doesnât live like a typical
billionaire - he says he enjoys inexpensive
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hobbies like playing video games, listening
to music and reading, and spending time with
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his kids and his friends.
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âBut,â he says, whenever he has any free
time âitâs usually âwork moreâ.â
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Through hard work and laser-like focus - and
with a generous helping of luck - Elon Musk
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managed to do the impossible once again, surpassing
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to become the richest
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person in the world as of January 2021.
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In the cutthroat world of business, only time
will tell whether Musk will be able to hang
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on to the top spot.
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Musk was right on point when he tweeted âBack
to workâ in response to the news that he
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was the worldâs richest person.
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Tesla is still a relatively new company, and
it only turned its first profit in 2020.
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Muskâs recent ascension to the top of the
list of the worldâs richest people has only
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put more pressure on the billionaire innovator
to prove that Tesla can live up to expectations
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and become more profitable than the entire
motor industry combined in order to justify
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its current valuation, which is the cornerstone
of Muskâs net worth.
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No matter how Elon Musk became the richest
person in the world, and regardless of whether
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he manages to stay at the top, weâre sure
to see some interesting things from Musk and
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Tesla in the future!
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If you thought this video was fascinating,
youâll definitely want to be sure and check
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out our other videos, like this one called
âElon Musk vs. the Average American - How
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Do They Compare?â, or, maybe youâll like
this other video, instead.
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