The £250 billion TECH BONANZA
Internet titans pocket £29m per hour in 2020
THE billionaires behind America’s biggest technology companies added nearly £250bn to their fortunes this year – about £29m per hour.
Even as the Covid-19 pandemic hammered the world economy, internet titans have seen their share prices soar as the crisis pushes more people towards digital services.
That has helped the likes of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest person, Tesla boss Elon Musk and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg add tens of billions of pounds to their wealth, analysis by the Mail has found.
Musk, 49, has made the biggest gains, adding an astonishing £94bn to his fortune in 2020. He is now worth £115bn overall – making him the world’s second-richest person.
Tesla, his electric car company, overtook Toyota to become the most valuable automotive firm over the summer, with its shares up by more than 600pc this year.
The father- of- seven, who had his latest child named X AE AXII with pop star Grimes in May, owns properties in Los Angeles and Texas, where his rocket firm SpaceX has major test facilities.
Meanwhile, Amazon founder Bezos, 56, has added £54bn to his fortune, taking it to £139bn.
The entrepreneur, who is dati ng American television presenter Lauren Sanchez, has benefited from a 70pc rise in his company’s share price this year as shoppers have flocked online during the pandemic.
In the third quarter, Amazon raked in £295,000 sales every minute – an increase of 32pc compared to 2019.
Bezos pledged £7bn towards causes that will help fight climate change earlier this year. He has also used his wealth to fund rocket company Blue Origin and buy properties including mansions in Washington state, Los Angeles, Washington DC, a ranch in Texas and New York apartments overlooking Central Park.
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s boss and founder, added £17bn to his fortune, which now stands at £ 75bn. The 36- year- old, who founded the company in his dorm at Harvard University, is married to Priscilla Chan, with whom he has two children.
He has used his fortune to buy properties in Palo Alto, Lake Tahoe, and San Francisco, California, as well as on Kauai Island in Hawaii. He has agreed to give most of his wealth away as part of the so-called Giving Pledge.
After the Facebook boss, Mackenzie Scott, Bezos’ ex-wife, was the next biggest beneficiary of the shares boom, gaining about £15bn. She received a £28bn settlement – largely consisting of Amazon stock – when she split from her former husband last year in the world’s biggest-ever divorce. She is now worth £43bn.
This month, the 50-year- old novelist revealed she had given £3bn to charitable groups providing relief during the coronavirus crisis.
Other tech billionaires have also added to their fortunes. Microsoft founder Bill Gates, 65, saw his wealth rise by about £13bn to £97bn. He has donated hundreds of millions of pounds to efforts to find a coronavirus vaccine. And Steve Ballmer, 64, the former boss of Microsoft, saw his fortune rise by £17bn to about £60bn.
Oracle founder Larry Ellison, 76, increased his wealth by £15bn to £59bn, while Google co-founders Sergi Brin and Larry Page saw their combined fortunes rise by about £24bn to £118bn.
Overall, the billionaires have added a combined £249.5bn to their wealth in 2020. That is equivalent to roughly £692.9m per day – or £28.9m per hour.