TOPLINE Billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk stirred up the cryptocurrency market with his Twitter account again Sunday when he appeared to hint Tesla would cast out its bitcoin holdings, a move that saw the cryptocurrency plunge.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h3>



When a Twitter user&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/CryptoWhale/status/1393981793813078017?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">speculated</a>&nbsp;Sunday Musk would ditch bitcoin over the hate the billionaire had received after announcing Tesla would&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/joewalsh/2021/05/12/tesla-will-stop-accepting-bitcoin-as-payment-due-to-environmental-worries-musk-says/">no longer accept the cryptocurrency</a>&nbsp;as payment last week, Musk replied with one word: “<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1394001894809427971?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Indeed</a>.”&nbsp;



The vague message was enough to push cryptocurrency investors to sell off their bitcoin, and the price dipped nearly 8.5% down to $44,395 a coin Sunday.



Cryptocurrency is notoriously volatile, but Sunday’s dip was bitcoin’s biggest slump in more than three months and represented one of its biggest drops in value since the price first began to rapidly ramp up in January.&nbsp;



Last week, Musk said Tesla would no longer accept the cryptocurrency until bitcoin, which requires colossal amounts of electricity to work with, shifts to&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1392602041025843203" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">more sustainable energy use</a>,



Musk said at the time Tesla would not sell off the bitcoin it already had.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">Indeed&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1394001894809427971?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 16, 2021</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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<h2 class="wp-block-heading">BIG NUMBER</h2>



$1.5 billion. That’s how much Musk spent on buying bitcoin just&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/08/tesla-buys-1point5-billion-in-bitcoin.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">three months ago</a>, in preparation for using the cryptocurrency at Tesla.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">SURPRISING FACT</h2>



Running bitcoin uses&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56012952" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">more electricity</a>&nbsp;than some countries, according to a University of Cambridge study published in February. Researchers said the cryptocurrency burns through 121.36 terawatt-hours annually, roughly the equivalent of used by countries like&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56012952" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Argentina and Norway</a>.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">KEY BACKGROUND</h3>



Just two months ago,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2021/03/24/bitcoin-surges-as-elon-musk-says-it-can-be-used-to-buy-teslas/?sh=4e37216b3cb2">bitcoin prices soared</a>&nbsp;when Musk announced Tesla would accept the cryptocurrency as payment for Tesla’s pricey electric vehicles. Musk’s quick reversal last week to suspend Tesla bitcoin payments and the cryptocurrency’s loss of value soon after angered many bitcoin investors, who said the billionaire was&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/PeterMcCormack/status/1393971202738302986?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">misinformed</a>&nbsp;about bitcoin’s energy consumption. Musk has&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1393995872413888518?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">bickered</a>&nbsp;with and&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1393246529498976258?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">made fun of</a>&nbsp;the bitter investors on Twitter in recent days.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">TANGENT</h3>



Musk is no stranger to playing the cryptocurrency market with his tweets. His current cryptocurrency of choice, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2021/05/14/dogecoin-stages-a-comeback-amid-cryptos-300-billion-crash-soaring-30-as-elon-musk-and-coinbase-signal-confidence/?sh=258f1752672f">dogecoin</a>, is regularly boosted by the eccentric CEO’s Twitter memes and public enthusiasm. 



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">👀&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1383103246470811652?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 16, 2021</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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<h3 class="wp-block-heading">FURTHER READING</h3>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/joewalsh/2021/05/12/tesla-will-stop-accepting-bitcoin-as-payment-due-to-environmental-worries-musk-says/?sh=39f2924f6e9f">Tesla Will Stop Accepting Bitcoin As Payment Due To Environmental Worries, Musk Says</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2021/05/12/elon-musk-says-tesla-stops-accepting-bitcoin-for-car-purchases-due-to-carbon-energy-use/?sh=34e39d386f85">Bitcoin Tanks After Elon Musk Says Tesla Stops Accepting It Due To Carbon Energy Use</a> (Forbes)



by Carlie Porterfield, Forbes Staff

gettyimages-1130598362-594×594

Elon Musk Sends Bitcoin Tumbling With A One-Word Tweet

TOPLINE&nbsp;Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed he has&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/joewalsh/2021/05/09/elon-musk-reveals-he-has-aspergers-on-saturday-night-live/?sh=6832e336f640">Asperger’s syndrome&nbsp;</a>during his opening monologue while hosting Saturday Night Live, but is far from the first billionaire businessman to divulge he is neurodivergent.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h3>



Fellow billionaire and investment management firm founder Bill Gross revealed in 2019 he too had been&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2019-03-01/bill-gross-on-his-asperger-s-diagnosis-and-its-advantages-video?fbclid=IwAR1H-gbsnDylCQB2hPCnkaQt15MQqS71DtsQMBU2O_jHjpUWqm3HUX_xlLE&amp;sref=q1G25G4a" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">diagnosed with Asperger’s</a>, telling Bloomberg he believes the condition makes him a better investor: “It allows you to focus on longer-term things without getting mixed up in the details,” Gross said.



Gross, estimated by&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;to be worth about&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/bill-gross/?sh=6d33e30235b9">$1.5 billion</a>, also said the diagnosis likely explains his trouble maintaining eye contact and his almost obsessive interest in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-07/bond-guru-bill-gross-to-sell-42-2-million-stamp-collection" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">collecting stamps</a>.



Richard Branson, estimated by&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;to have a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/richard-branson/?sh=5a09c9836ff5">$4.2 billion</a>&nbsp;fortune, opened up about being dyslexic in a 2018 blog post, writing that as a child he was labeled “<a href="https://www.virgin.com/branson-family/richard-branson-blog/my-top-three-strategies-dyslexic-children" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">lazy and dumb</a>” for struggling in school: “Dyslexia is just a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.virgin.com/branson-family/richard-branson-blog/my-top-three-strategies-dyslexic-children" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">different, creative way of thinking</a>,” Branson said, adding he thinks the condition makes him&nbsp;<a href="https://www.virgin.com/branson-family/richard-branson-blog/dyslexia-and-imagination" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">more imaginative</a>.



Charles Schwab, who founded the nation’s largest brokerage firm and has an estimated&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/charles-schwab/?sh=71652fdc2e4b">$11.4 billion</a>&nbsp;fortune, has also had lifelong troubles&nbsp;<a href="https://stanfordmag.org/contents/charles-schwab-s-secret-struggle" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reading and writing</a>&nbsp;because of dyslexia.



Late Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad, estimated by&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;to be worth as much as&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maxjedeurpalmgren/2018/01/28/ingvar-kamprad-founder-of-ikea-dead-at-91/?sh=6e3f452c4972">$28 billion</a>&nbsp;between 2005 and 2010, was dyslexic and even decided to give Ikea products their&nbsp;<a href="https://qz.com/1191091/ingvar-kamprad-and-his-ikea-empire-nine-intriguing-facts/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">distinct Swedish names</a>&nbsp;because his diagnosis made working with typical inventory numbers difficult for him.



By Carlie Porterfield, Forbes Staff

Key Speakers At The Satellite 2020 Conference

It’s Not Just Elon Musk — These Billionaires Are Also Neurodivergent

TOPLINE Swedish billionaire and Spotify CEO Daniel Ek is launching a bid to take over the English soccer club Arsenal with support from three major former stars of the London-based team, the&nbsp;Telegraph&nbsp;<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2021/04/26/exclusive-spotify-founder-launch-arsenal-takeover-bid-three/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>, just days after Ek&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2021/04/23/spotifys-daniel-ek-says-he-would-buy-arsenal-if-billionaire-stan-kroenke-agreed-to-sell/?sh=310146166daf">expressed interes</a>t on Twitter in buying the club from its increasingly unpopular American owners.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h3>



<ul><li>According to the&nbsp;Telegraph, Ek is teaming up with Arsenal legends Thierry Henry, Dennis Bergkamp and Patrick Vieira—who were part of the famous ‘Invincible’ team that won the Premier League title in 2004—to make the bid.</li></ul>



<ul><li>If Ek’s bid is successful the three former Arsenal stars could return to the club and be part of a new administrative setup, leveraging their knowledge of the club and its fan base, the report adds.</li></ul>



<ul><li>The reported bid comes at a time when the club’s American owner—billionaire Stanley Kroenke—has faced anger from fans for his apparent involvement in the failed attempt to set up the breakaway European Super League.</li></ul>



<ul><li>While Kroenke’s son Josh insisted last week that the club wasn’t for sale, the report suggests that the involvement of three popular club legends in the bid would put pressure on him to at least listen to Ek’s offer.</li></ul>



<ul><li>Forbes&nbsp;has reached out to Ek and Spotify for a comment.</li></ul>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h3>



“As a kid growing up, I’ve cheered for Arsenal as long as I can remember,” Ek tweeted last week while fans were protesting against Kroenke&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/eldsjal/status/1385667437929062403?s=20+" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">outside</a>&nbsp;the club’s stadium. “If KSE [Kroenke Sports &amp; Entertainment] would like to sell Arsenal I&#8217;d be happy to throw my hat in the ring.”



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-number">BIG NUMBER</h3>



$2.8 billion. That’s the amount the London-based soccer club was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2021/04/12/the-worlds-most-valuable-soccer-teams-barcelona-on-top-at-48-billion/?sh=434fc0ae16ac">valued</a>&nbsp;at by&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;earlier this month, and it ranked eighth on the list of the world’s most valuable soccer clubs for 2021. Ek, whose fortune comes from his 9% stake in music streaming giant Spotify—which he co-founded in 2006—has a net worth of $4.7 billion,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/daniel-ek/?sh=1a2efab846ab">according to</a>&nbsp;Forbes’&nbsp;calculations.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-contra">CONTRA</h3>



Josh Kroenke, a director at the club, spoke at an Arsenal fans’ forum last week where he apologized to angry supporters for Arsenal’s involvement in the breakaway European Soccer League—which the club has since withdrawn from. But despite demands for them to do so, Kroenke insisted that his family was not looking to sell the club. “When are we going to sell? I am not willing to answer that question because we have no intention of selling,” he said.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h3>



Last week, a group of Europe’s twelve biggest soccer clubs announced their plans to start a breakaway European Super League. Soccer fans across Europe—including fans of the clubs involved in the planned competition—<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddawkins/2021/04/20/billionaire-roman-abramovich-pulls-chelsea-out-of-super-league/?sh=47b5928a1a7a">rose up in revolt</a>&nbsp;against the plan. The most vocal opposition came from fans of the six English clubs who had signed up for the league, including Arsenal. The planned league&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2021/04/21/shares-tumble-as-europes-soccer-super-league-crumbles-amid-widespread-outrage/?sh=4cf604e13a01">unraveled</a>&nbsp;just 48 hours after it was announced as the six founding English clubs announced their exit following the fan revolt and legislative threats from British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Fans have continued to denounce the team owners for their involvement in formulating this competition with most of the wrath being directed at American owners of Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool. #KroenkeOut was trending on Twitter last week as fans demanded Kroenke divest his ownership of Arsenal. In an&nbsp;<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2021/04/24/thierry-henry-speaks-arsenal-protests-fans-will-decide-future/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">interview</a>&nbsp;with the&nbsp;Telegraph&nbsp;last week, Theirry Henry—Arsenal’s all-time top goalscorer—criticized Stan Kroenke and the KSE and said he doesn&#8217;t recognize his club anymore after their involvement in the Super League fiasco. Henry, however, made no mention of his involvement in Ek’s bid at the time.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tangent">TANGENT</h3>



Arsenal owner Stanley Kroenke built a fortune in real estate—much of it from shopping plazas near Walmart stores—and is&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/stanley-kroenke/?sh=48321581742c">worth</a>&nbsp;$8.2 billion, according to&nbsp;Forbes. Kroenke runs a global sports empire that also includes the NFL team Los Angeles Rams and the NBA team Denver Nuggets.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h3>



<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2021/04/26/exclusive-spotify-founder-launch-arsenal-takeover-bid-three/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Spotify founder to launch Arsenal takeover bid with three former &#8216;Invincibles&#8217;</a>&nbsp;(The Telegraph)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2021/04/23/spotifys-daniel-ek-says-he-would-buy-arsenal-if-billionaire-stan-kroenke-agreed-to-sell/?sh=310146166daf">Spotify’s Daniel Ek Says He Would Buy Arsenal If Billionaire Stan Kroenke Agreed To Sell</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)

Samsung Unveils New Galaxy Note Smart Phone

Spotify’s CEO Is Reportedly Teaming Up With Three Arsenal Legends To Make A Bid For English Soccer Club

Billionaire Elon Musk saw his net worth fall on Monday, as shares of his electric car company dropped following reports that two people died in a fatal Tesla&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/tesla" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">TSLA</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/tesla">-3.4%</a>&nbsp;crash over the weekend.



Shares of Tesla were down 3.8% as of 3:45 p.m. EST on Monday, shaving $5.6 billion off Musk’s fortune.&nbsp;He’s now worth $174.1 billion, according to&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;estimates. The Tesla CEO and cofounder is the third-richest person in the world—behind Amazon&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/amazon" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">AMZN</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/amazon">-0.8%</a>&nbsp;CEO Jeff Bezos, who has a net worth of $195.9 billion, and French luxury goods tycoon Bernard Arnault, who is worth $180.3 billion.



Tesla’s stock fell on Monday amid&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/two-dead-tesla-crash-texas-that-was-believed-be-driverless-wsj-2021-04-18/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reports</a>&nbsp;that two men died after their 2019 Tesla Model S crashed into a tree north of Houston on Saturday night. Local authorities said that they believed the vehicle was operating without anyone in the driver’s seat—with one of the men reportedly in the front passenger’s seat and the other in the back seat of the Tesla. The vehicle was traveling at high speeds along a curve before veering off the road and bursting into flames at around 11:25 p.m., police said.



Harris County Precinct 4 Constable Mark Herman told the media in a statement that it took emergency crews about four hours to put out the Model S fire, saying that the team even contacted Tesla for help. While electric vehicles are not necessarily more dangerous than gas-powered vehicles, high-voltage lithium batteries like the ones used in Tesla can&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-studies/Documents/SR2001.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reignite even after an initial fire is put out</a>, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.



<figure class="wp-block-embed aligncenter is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">Two men killed after Tesla that may have been in autonomous driving or self driving mode didn’t adhere to a curve, slammed into a tree then burst into flames in the Woodlands, officials say. Firefighters say they had to call Tesla to figure out how to oust the blaze. <a href="https://twitter.com/KPRC2?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@KPRC2</a> <a href="https://t.co/nmhDxKeTHT">pic.twitter.com/nmhDxKeTHT</a>&mdash; Deven Clarke (@KPRC2Deven) <a href="https://twitter.com/KPRC2Deven/status/1383791730575638542?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 18, 2021</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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The crash also raises further questions about Tesla’s Autopilot feature. Authorities were not yet certain if Autopilot was active during the crash which killed the two men, aged 59 and 69, respectively. Nonetheless, the company’s semiautomated driving system has faced mounting scrutiny following a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/tesla-crash-suspected-of-involving-autopilot-draws-investigation-11616030206?mod=article_inline" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">series of accidents</a>&nbsp;involving Tesla vehicles in recent months. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said last month that it had launched more than two dozen investigations into crashes of Tesla vehicles, and on Monday&nbsp;<a href="https://news.yahoo.com/fatal-tesla-crash-driverless-200259765.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;that it would also be investigating the most recent crash north of Houston.



Tesla, which does not have a media relations department, does not appear to have issued any statements in the wake of the accident. Both the company and its billionaire CEO, however, have repeatedly&nbsp;<a href="https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">touted the safety</a>&nbsp;of Tesla vehicles and the Autopilot feature. Musk, who is active on Twitter with nearly 52 million followers,&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1383548841438236674?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">posted</a>&nbsp;on Saturday afternoon prior to the accident that a Tesla with Autopilot engaged is nearly ten times less likely to be involved in an accident than an average car.



Update 6:45 pm EST, April 19: Later on Monday, Musk&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1384254194975010826?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">posted</a>&nbsp;on Twitter denying that Tesla’s Autopilot feature was involved in the crash. Data logs recovered from the accident “show Autopilot was not enabled” and that the car did not purchase Full Self-Driving (FSD), the Tesla CEO said in his tweet. “Moreover, standard Autopilot would require lane lines to turn on, which this street did not have,” Musk wrote.



By <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Sergei Klebnikov</a>,Forbes Staff

Billionaire Elon Musk Receives Axel Springer Award

Elon Musk’s Fortune Falls Nearly $6 Billion After Tesla Crash Leaves Two Dead

TOPLINE Shares of Coinbase, the nation’s largest crypto exchange, skyrocketed nearly 60% within minutes of their public-market debut on Wednesday, propelling the nine-year-old company’s market capitalization to more than 12 times its last private valuation of $8 billion in 2018 and marking another instance of booming demand lifting the still-nascent cryptocurrency space to meteoric highs.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h4>



Listed on the Nasdaq exchange under the ticker COIN, shares started trading at about 1:30 p.m. EDT Wednesday and immediately surged to a price of more than $398, eclipsing the $250 reference price set on Tuesday.



The soaring stock price boosted the firm’s market capitalization to roughly $105 billion, making Coinbase one of the 100 most valuable publicly traded companies in the United States and more valuable than both New York Stock Exchange parent Intercontinental Exchange and Nasdaq Inc.—combined.



Eschewing the traditional initial public offering that enlists investment banks as intermediaries and underwriters to sell shares ahead of trading, San Francisco-based Coinbase opted instead for a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffkauflin/2021/01/29/coinbase-investors-say-it-could-hit-100-billion-valuation-when-it-goes-public/">direct listing</a>, selling 114.9 million shares on Wednesday directly to the public.



“I wanted there to be just a true market on day one that set the price, not something that was set behind closed doors,” Coinbase&#8217;s billionaire CEO, Brian Armstrong, said on CNBC Wednesday, calling the direct listing “more true to the ethos of crypto.”



Ahead of its listing, Coinbase&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/04/06/coinbase-posts-record-18-billion-revenue-as-crypto-market-shoots-past-2-trillion-direct-listing/">reported</a>&nbsp;first-quarter revenue that climbed nearly 900% from $190.6 million in the same period last year, blowing past the $585 million it nabbed in the fourth quarter.



Update 5 p.m. EDT: Coinbase shares closed Wednesday at a price of roughly $328, up 31% from the reference price and giving Coinbase a market capitalization of about $86 billion.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE&nbsp;</h4>



“The Coinbase [listing] is a watershed moment and historical event for the crypto industry and something Wall Street will be laser-focused on to gauge investor appetite going forward,” Wedbush Analyst Dan Ives said in a Wednesday morning note to clients, calling Coinbase a “barometer” for growing mainstream [crypto] adoption.&nbsp;



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h4>



Coinbase’s foray into the public market comes after a massive year of growth for cryptocurrencies, fueled by inflationary concerns and heightened institutional adoption. Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs started offering cryptocurrency to their wealthy clients just last month, and companies like Tesla, MicroStrategy and payments fintech Square have purchased billions of dollars of bitcoin as a means to diversify their largely U.S. dollar-based balance sheets. Up a staggering 825% over the past year, bitcoin hit its latest high, of just under $65,000, early Wednesday morning. The total cryptocurrency market is worth more than $2.2 trillion.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-chief-critic">CHIEF CRITIC</h4>



“Even though Coinbase’s revenue surged over the past 12 months, the company has little to no chance of meeting the future profit expectations that are baked into its ridiculously high expected valuation of $100 billion,” says David Trainer, the CEO of investment research firm New Constructs. “The crypto markets are very young, and we expect many more companies to compete for the profits Coinbase enjoys today.”



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tangent">TANGENT</h4>



Coinbase joins a growing rank of buzzy tech companies that have started trading over the past year—to varying degrees of fanfare. Gen-Z gaming platform Roblox, which similarly opted for a direct listing, jumped more than 50% on its&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/03/10/roblox-valuation-hits-42-billion-as-gen-z-gaming-giant-skyrockets-50-in-ipo/">first trading day</a>&nbsp;in January and has since climbed about 6% higher. Airbnb and Doordash debuted in December, and both roughly doubled on their first day of trading, but&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2020/12/10/airbnb-ipo-shares-valuation-billion-more-than-marriott-hilton-hyatt/">Airbnb</a>&nbsp;has jumped about 25% since then, while&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2020/12/09/doordash-ipo-shares-first-day-of-trading/">DoorDash</a>&nbsp;has tanked 23%.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-to-watch-for">WHAT TO WATCH FOR</h4>



Crypto regulation. “With cryptocurrencies’ astronomical price jumps, and as they become increasingly embedded in the global financial system, investors must expect much greater government scrutiny,” Nigel Green, the CEO of $12 billion advisory deVere Group, said in a Wednesday note, adding that Coinbase’s direct listing will help the firm reach a wider investment base other than “the usual crypto evangelists.” Gary Gensler, a blockchain and cryptocurrency professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/04/14/gary-gensler-confirmed-sec-chairman/">confirmed</a>&nbsp;as the Securities and Exchange Commission’s new chairman on Wednesday, and one SEC official has said&nbsp; he’s “sympathetic to the call for regulatory clarity” in the space.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h4>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/04/13/bitcoin-hits-new-high-ahead-of-coinbase-listing-but-74-of-fund-managers-think-its-just-a-bubble/">Bitcoin Hits New High Ahead Of Coinbase Listing, But 74% Of Fund Managers Think It&#8217;s Just A Bubble</a>&nbsp;&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/04/06/coinbase-posts-record-18-billion-revenue-as-crypto-market-shoots-past-2-trillion-direct-listing/">Coinbase Posts Record $1.8 Billion In Revenue As Crypto Market Shoots Past $2 Trillion</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2020/02/19/coinbase-billionaire-brian-armstrongs-plan-to-make-bitcoin-ethereum-xrp-safe-for-all/">Bitcoin&#8217;s Guardian Angel: Inside Coinbase Billionaire Brian Armstrong&#8217;s Plan To Make Crypto Safe For All</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffkauflin/2021/01/29/coinbase-investors-say-it-could-hit-100-billion-valuation-when-it-goes-public/">Coinbase Investors Say It Could Hit $100 Billion Valuation When It Goes Public</a> (Forbes)



By Jonathan Ponciano, Forbes Staff

In this photo illustration, the Nasdaq Stock Market logo

Coinbase Skyrockets In Nasdaq Listing, Landing $105 Billion Valuation On First Day Of Trading

With KKW Beauty and popular shapewear firm Skims, Kardashian West’s net worth increases to $1 billion, earning her a spot on Forbes’ World’s Billionaires List.



When Kim Kardashian West was first mentioned in the pages of&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;in 2011, it was simply a tally of her Twitter followers: 6.6 million, just below Barack Obama and just above Ashton Kutcher. Five years later, she graced the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/natalierobehmed/2016/07/11/kim-kardashian-mobile-mogul-the-forbes-cover-story/?sh=4d20a0467e4f">cover</a>&nbsp;of&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;thanks to her booming mobile game, which helped her earn $51 million that year. Now, she officially joins the World’s Billionaires list for the first time.



Forbes&nbsp;estimates that Kardashian West is now worth $1 billion, up from $780 million in October, thanks to two lucrative businesses—KKW Beauty and Skims—as well as cash from reality television and endorsement deals, and a number of smaller investments.



Kardashian West founded KKW Beauty in 2017, following the success of her half-sister Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics. She borrowed from Kylie’s playbook, using a similar direct-to-consumer model that relies heavily on social media marketing. Her first launch, 300,000 contour kits,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/natalierobehmed/2018/07/11/why-kim-kardashian-west-is-worth-350-million/?sh=6a87c5004f7b">sold out within two hours</a>. By 2018, the business had expanded into eyeshadows, concealers, lipsticks and fragrances, and was bringing in about&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/natalierobehmed/2018/07/11/why-kim-kardashian-west-is-worth-350-million/?sh=6a87c5004f7b">$100 million in revenue.</a>



&#8220;It’s the first time I&#8217;ve moved away from having licensing deals and transitioned into being an owner,&#8221; Kardashian West told&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/natalierobehmed/2017/06/13/how-kim-kardashian-west-bounced-back-to-45-5-million-and-a-new-cosmetics-company/?sh=6b6453f68f59">Forbes</a>&nbsp;in 2017, when she announced her cosmetics line.



She cashed in on that ownership last year when she sold 20% of KKW Beauty to cosmetics conglomerate Coty for $200 million, a deal that valued the company at $1 billion. While Forbes estimates that figure is a little bloated—Coty, which also bought 51% of Kylie Cosmetics in 2020, is known for overpaying—her remaining 72% stake is still worth about $500 million, by our count.



Then there’s Skims, the shapewear line Kardashian West launched in 2019. She raised money from fashion insiders like Net-a-Porter’s Natalie Massane and Theory’s Andrew Rosen, and capitalized on her massive social media following to shill the brand. (She now has 69.6 million Twitter followers and 213 million followers on Instagram.) Skims has been quick on its feet: During the pandemic, when consumers became more interested in comfy clothes for the couch than in smoothing their stomachs under evening gowns, she swiftly started turning the focus to loungewear.



Kardashian West owns a majority stake in closely-held Skims, which hasn’t disclosed its revenues. A source familiar with Skims told Forbes about a transaction that values the shapewear company north of $500 million. As a result, Forbes estimates her Skims stake is worth a conservative $225 million, enough to lift her fortune to $1 billion.



The rest of Kardashian West’s fortune sits in cash and investments, including real estate. Every year since 2012, she has earned at least $10 million pretax, by&nbsp;Forbes’&nbsp;count, thanks to paychecks from&nbsp;Keeping Up With the Kardashians,&nbsp;endorsement deals and endeavors like the aforementioned mobile game and her now-defunct Kimoji app. She’s also got three properties in Calabasas, northwest of Los Angeles, and a portfolio of blue-chip investments, including shares of Disney, Amazon, Netflix and Adidas that her soon-to-be ex-husband Kanye West gifted her for Christmas in 2017.&nbsp;



But it’s the companies that she has launched herself, and grown with the typical Kardashian flare for self-promotion, that land her on the World’s Billionaires list. As she tweeted the day she made the cover of Forbes, mocking the criticism she’s received for years: “Not bad for a girl with no talent.”



By <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/">Madeline Berg</a>Forbes Staff

2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party Hosted By Radhika Jones – Arrivals

Kim Kardashian West Is Officially A Billionaire

The world’s fourth-richest person has a plan to save the planet from catastrophic climate change — and it&#8217;s cheaper than you think.



Bill Gates wants you to know two numbers: 51 billion and zero. The former is the number of tons of greenhouse gases typically added to the atmosphere each year as a result of human activities. The latter is the number of tons we need to get to by 2050 in order to avert a climate crisis.



Gates has a plan for how to go from 51 billion to zero, and he’s happy to say it doesn’t come with a price tag in the trillions of dollars. As you might expect from a guy who made his fortune in technology, the billionaire’s suggested solution is tied in large part to innovation.&nbsp;



He spells out his plan in a new book,&nbsp;How To Avoid A Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have And The Breakthroughs We Need,&nbsp;to be released on February 16. Ahead of the book launch, Gates talked to&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;about why he wrote the book. He also shared details the book doesn’t get into, including how much he’s invested in zero-carbon companies, which ones he’s most excited about, including a new kind of nuclear power plant, and what he’s likely to invest in next.



Goal number one of the book, says Gates, is to clearly lay out which sectors of the economy are producing the 51 billion tons of greenhouse gases the world typically adds to the atmosphere each year. “The actual numeric framework, which is the most basic thing for any problem you want to tackle&#8230;that’s really been missing,” Gates says in a video interview from a conference room in his offices in Seattle. (See table for the percentage breakdown.)  The goal we as a planet need to aim for: zero emissions by 2050. Gates is optimistic that as hard as it sounds, we can get there.   



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<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-how-it-adds-up-globally-51-billion-tons">How It Adds Up Globally: 51 Billion Tons  </h2>



Emissions dropped about 5% in 2020 due to the pandemic, Gates estimates. But in a normal year the world adds 51 billion tons of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, Gates writes in his book.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="594" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-1024x594.png" alt="" class="wp-image-50037" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-1024x594.png 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-300x174.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-768x446.png 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-1536x892.png 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34-600x348.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Screenshot-2021-02-18-at-11.05.34.png 1602w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>Photo by Forbes </figcaption></figure>



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Gates admits, both in his book and when we spoke, that he is an imperfect messenger on climate change. “The very idea that one person is saying they know what we should do —appropriately, there is some pushback,” he says. In his book, he writes, “The world is not exactly lacking in rich men with big ideas about what other people should do, or who think technology can fix any problem.” He admits to owning big houses and flying in private jets, though he tells me that he buys carbon offsets for $400 a ton for the private jet flights he takes. “I can’t deny being a rich guy with an opinion. I do believe, though, that it is an informed opinion, and I am always trying to learn more,” he writes.&nbsp;



Gates presciently warned in a 2015 talk about the dangers of a global pandemic and what we’d need to do to prepare for it. Similarly, this is not his first public prescription for the climate. In 2010 he gave a<a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates_innovating_to_zero?language=en" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;TED talk</a>&nbsp;calling for the need to eliminate carbon emissions by 2050. He’s continued to consult experts in the field and delve into the latest in climate science and policy. In 2015 he got involved in the Paris Climate Summit, calling France’s then president, Francois Hollande, and encouraging him to get countries to agree to raise their R&amp;D budgets for clean tech innovation. Twenty countries signed on. Says Gates, “Although we did not see all those countries double their R&amp;D budgets, we did see some increase. That’s sort of when the field started to focus on can we get this innovation to take place.”



To help put a framework around progress and the cost of new carbon-free innovations, Gates and his team came up with a term called “Green Premium” and introduced it in his blog,<a href="https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Introducing-the-Green-Premiums" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;Gates Notes</a>, in September last year. As he explains it, the Green Premium spells out the difference in cost between a product or process that doesn’t emit carbon with one that does. Green Premiums have fallen in the passenger car sector to the point where more people are buying electric cars (though Gates points out that just 2% of global auto sales are electric vehicles). In the industrial sector, however, Green Premiums are much higher. Says Gates, “The hardest problems to solve are in areas like steel and concrete and even transportation things like aviation fuel.” The problems he’s referring to: coming up with processes to make these products that don’t emit greenhouse gases. The research is in its early stages, and that’s where government R&amp;D can play a role, Gates suggests.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">What’s It All Going To Cost?&nbsp;</h3>



In December, Gates suggested<a href="https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/How-the-US-can-lead-on-climate-change-innovation" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;in his blog</a>&nbsp;that the U.S. create a National Institutes of Energy Innovation to help the country take the lead in climate change innovation. The idea is to model it after the National Institutes of Health, the backbone of U.S. medical research, which has an annual budget of about $37 billion. Gates says current U.S. government R&amp;D spending on energy innovation is about $7 billion annually; that would need to be quintupled to match government spending on the NIH.



Another suggestion from Gates: shift the tax credits now available for solar and wind to more nascent areas like offshore wind, energy storage and new types of steel. “If you do that, and maybe double or triple the amount you spend on those tax benefits, then I do think that will be just a monumental contribution from the Biden administration,” he explains.



Whatever tech innovation comes out of the U.S. or elsewhere has to be affordable enough for countries like India to adopt it, Gates points out. Right now, the U.S. accounts for 14% of the world’s emissions. If just the U.S. gets to zero carbon emissions, we won’t be solving the problem globally.&nbsp;



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Where Gates Is Investing</h3>



Gates, whose<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/bill-gates/?sh=68241add689f">&nbsp;$124 billion fortune</a>&nbsp;stems from an estimated 1% stake in Microsoft and a variety of other investments, says in the book he’s put “more than $1 billion” into companies working toward zero emissions. How much more? Altogether, he tells&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;it’s about $2 billion. He describes himself as perhaps the biggest funder of direct air capture technologies—methods to capture carbon from the air. Two of the more well-known companies he’s been an investor in are producing plant-based meats:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/chloesorvino/2020/07/30/impossible-foods-joins-beyond-on-the-shelves-of-walmart-americas-no-1-meat-seller/?sh=3d7caaf52685">Impossible Foods</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/chloesorvino/2020/11/16/green-and-lean-beyond-meat-announces-two-new-better-for-you-plant-based-burgers/?sh=49333f12299f">Beyond Meat</a>. Some of his investing he categorizes as philanthropic, like the money he’s put toward an open source climate model that aims to show how electricity generation will work in long periods of tough weather when wind and solar would be shut down.&nbsp;



His biggest bet has been on TerraPower, a nuclear power company with a reactor that uses depleted uranium as its fuel. Gates founded the company with a few others more than a decade ago. In 2017, TerraPower formed a joint venture with a Chinese company and was planning to produce its first reactor in China. That deal was scuttled by the U.S. government, which in late 2019 blocked U.S. cooperation with China on civilian nuclear power. Now the plan is to build a demonstration plant somewhere in the U.S. In October the U.S. Department of Energy awarded<a href="https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/us-department-energy-announces-160-million-first-awards-under-advanced-reactor" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;$80 million</a>&nbsp;to TerraPower toward construction of the plant; the agreement is that half of the funding will come from the private sector. Gates says, “That’s coming largely from me.”



His hope is that the demonstration plant will be built within five to seven years. “If things go well, that means that maybe in 10 years, commercial plant builders would take that design and build it ideally in the hundreds—which is what you need to have an impact on climate change.”&nbsp;



Gates has also invested in zero-carbon companies through Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a group he assembled that&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryadolan/2016/12/12/bill-gates-launches-1-billion-breakthrough-energy-investment-fund/?sh=41728d6a5b7d">launched in December 2016</a>. “It was a lot easier to raise the money than I expected,” he says. “I made about 22 calls and got about 20 yeses for the first billion.” Investors include billionaires such as&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/jeff-bezos/?sh=548de8471b23">Jeff Bezos</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/vinod-khosla/?sh=26fd668a3e07">Vinod Khosla</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/john-arnold/?sh=49c99d011001">John Arnold</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/john-doerr/?sh=53bd068026c5">John Doerr</a>; Gates says he’s the largest investor. So far Breakthrough Energy Ventures has invested in 40 companies; One, QuantumScape, which is developing lithium metal batteries for electric vehicles and has no revenues yet, went public through a SPAC last November. Though many of the companies are still early stage, Gates describes some as “really wild,” including QuidNet, which is working to store electricity by pumping water into pressured underground wells; when energy is needed, the water is released and goes through a turbine, creating electricity.&nbsp;



Breakthrough Energy Ventures raised another $1 billion fund in January, with most of the same initial investors and some newcomers. (Gates didn’t disclose names.) He says he’s the largest investor in the latest fund, too. The new fund will look to invest in more of the industrial processes like low-carbon cement and steel production as well as technologies to capture carbon from the air, Gates says.



Over the next five years, Gates says “I’ll put in at least $2 billion” toward zero-carbon technologies. But while a total of $4 billion is a lot of money, for someone worth more than $120 billion, it’s a small sliver of his overall investments. Says Gates, “It’s more limited by what is out there that can have a high impact.”



One of Gates’ other investments that’s been in the news recently seems to fly in the face of his zero-carbon focus. In early February, Gates’ investment arm, Cascade, partnered with Blackstone Group and private equity firm Global Infrastructure Partners in a $4.7 billion deal to buy Signature Aviation, the world’s largest operator of private jet bases. Private jet travel has been booming during the pandemic, but such travel emits a heck of a lot of greenhouse gases. How does he square the deal with the premise of his book? A spokesperson for Gates did not reply to the question.



Will Gates’ book influence policy makers and move the needle toward innovation in zero-carbon technologies? It helps that combating climate change is already one of the Biden administration’s top four priorities. Given that the book is addressing weighty material, it’s relatively easy to read, sprinkled with Gates’ personal observations&nbsp; and even a photo of him with his son Rory on a visit to a geothermal power plant in Iceland. (Gates says he and Rory liked to visit power plants for fun.) He mentions that he drives an electric car&nbsp;—&nbsp;the Porsche Taycan Turbo, which he describes to&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;as “ridiculously nice and ridiculously expensive” — that sells for $150,000 or more. (He’s such a fan that he got one of the first demo models, he adds.)



If nothing else, Gates wants to get people talking. “My hope is that we can shift the conversation by sharing the facts with the people in our lives— our family members, friends, and leaders.&nbsp;And not just the facts that tell us why we need to act, but also those that show us the actions that will do the most good,” he writes.&nbsp;



A bigger measure of his success will be whether the Biden administration adopts any of his policy proposals. Says Gates, “I do think that with those increases [in spending], we’ll be doing exactly what we need to do, not just for us, but for the entire world.”



By Kerry A. Dolan, Forbes Staff

2019 New York Times Dealbook

How To Solve Climate Change: Bill Gates Wants You To Know Two Numbers

Billionaire Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/16/elon-musks-spacex-raised-850-million-at-419point99-a-share.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reportedly</a>&nbsp;completed an $850 million fundraising round last week, as it looks to raise capital for its ambitious Starlink and Starship projects.&nbsp;



News of the funding was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/16/elon-musks-spacex-raised-850-million-at-419point99-a-share.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">first reported</a>&nbsp;by CNBC, which said that the private company will now have a valuation of around $74 billion, citing people familiar with the financing. SpaceX did not immediately respond to&nbsp;Forbes’ request for comment.



The company raised new funds at $419.99 per share, per CNBC. That price is just a cent below $420 per share, potentially a reference to Elon Musk’s notorious&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1026872652290379776" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Twitter post</a>&nbsp;in 2018, when he joked that he would take Tesla private at $420 with “funding secured.”



Musk—who is the world’s second-richest person, behind Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos—owned roughly 48% of SpaceX prior to this latest funding round, according to&nbsp;Forbes’ calculations.&nbsp;



It is not immediately clear if Musk’s ownership was diluted by the new round. If he managed to hold onto all 48%, his stake would now be worth about $32 billion—up from roughly $20 billion previously, according to&nbsp;Forbes’ estimates. That would boost Musk’s net worth by $12 billion—but that’s still not enough for him to pass Bezos and retake the spot of the richest person on the planet.&nbsp;



He is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/?sh=298803137999">worth</a> $173.4 billion as of market close on Tuesday, February 16, according to Forbes. Most of his fortune lies in his stake in electric car company Tesla, shares of which have more than quadrupled in value over the past 12 months. Musk also serves as CEO of Tesla.



SpaceX was last valued at $46 billion in an August 2020 fundraising round. But some Wall Street banks had put that value even higher: In October, a Morgan Stanley analyst gave SpaceX a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddawkins/2020/10/23/elon-musks-spacex-gets-bullish-100-billion-valuation-from-morgan-stanley-double-what-investors-said-it-was-worth-in-august/?sh=75aaf6b86e79">bullish valuation of $100 billion</a>—double what investors said it was worth in August.&nbsp;



The latest fundraising round comes in the midst of two capital-intensive projects, Starship and Starlink. Starship is the company’s long-term spacecraft project, intended to eventually replace SpaceX’s existing Falcon 9 rockets and Dragon spacecraft. The aim of the project is to develop a fully-reusable launch vehicle that is expected to take cargo, and eventually passengers, into space at a lower cost than other existing spacecraft.&nbsp;



Beyond&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2020/05/25/elon-musks-first-astronaut-launch-is-one-giant-leap-for-space-capitalism/#3df32c382b49">successfully launching</a>&nbsp;U.S. astronauts into space in May of last year, SpaceX said in 2020 that it was seeing “extraordinary demand” for its Starlink satellite broadband service. The project aims to build an interconnected network of about 12,000 small satellites in low Earth orbit. So far, early tests have shown broadbands speeds capable of playing online video games and streaming movies, but the service faces criticism over its&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wtva.com/content/news/State-leader-questions-high-cost-for-Starlink-internet-service-573706251.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">cost</a>&nbsp;and the company’s ability to&nbsp;<a href="https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/02/isps-step-up-fight-against-spacex-tell-fcc-that-starlink-will-be-too-slow/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">scale capacity</a>.



In addition to raising money for its large-scale projects, SpaceX also completed a secondary transaction in which SpaceX insiders and investors were able to sell an additional $750 million worth of their shares, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/16/elon-musks-spacex-raised-850-million-at-419point99-a-share.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according to</a> CNBC.



By Sergei Klebnikov, Forbes Staff

Elon Musk’s SpaceX Now Worth $74 Billion After Latest Fundraising Round: Report

South African- born, billionaire technology and space entrepreneur, Elon Musk, made history at the start of 2021, overtaking Amazon’s Jeff Bezos to become the richest man on Earth. While his fortune was made on this planet, his dreams to venture to the final frontier remain. FORBES AFRICA takes a look at his journey to becoming one of the world’s most celebrated innovators and one of the wealthiest men alive.



THE MAN WHO FAMOUSLY SAID THAT HE WOULDN’T BE HAPPY UNTIL WE WERE ALL LIVING ON MARS, IS NOW ONE OF THE RICHEST MEN ON EARTH. WHILE ELON MUSK’S PLANS TO BE BURIED IN A GALAXY FAR, FAR AWAY REMAIN UNCHANGED, HE’S STILL GOT MUCH TO CELEBRATE IN THE HERE AND NOW.



On January 8 this year, at approximately 11.30AM on the American East Coast, Musk, known for founding some of the world’s most progressive tech companies, along with his unrelenting space-age ambitions, made yet another historical leap.



His net worth soared by $12.5 billion, to $189.7 billion, making him, for a time, the wealthiest person on the planet, according to Forbes, who broke the news. For the first time, Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos, who had held the top spot for a record four years, came second with a cumulative net worth of $185 billion.



However, in a twist of fate, stock in his electric car company, Tesla, fell by 8%, denting his personal wealth by a hefty $14 billion, overnight. But like the man himself, Musk’s wealth wouldn’t be down for long.



<div class="wp-block-image is-style-default"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-819x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-49882" width="376" height="470" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-819x1024.jpg 819w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-240x300.jpg 240w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-768x960.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-1229x1536.jpg 1229w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-1638x2048.jpg 1638w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-300x375.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-600x750.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/GettyImages-1208933748-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 376px) 100vw, 376px" /><figcaption>UNIVERSAL CITY, CALIFORNIA &#8211; FEBRUARY 26: Model Maye Musk (Photo by Paul Archuleta/Getty Images)</figcaption></figure></div>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-large is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">Elon’s aim is to save the planet and he also loves the thought of going to Mars&#8230;. I get very excited every step of the way. We all do. Kimbal and Tosca [Elon’s siblings] and I go to the main [SpaceX] launches, we can’t go to all the launches, as he has launched, how many now&#8230; 50 rockets? I’m not sure. I lose track. But we go to the main ones, and we are anxious beforehand and excited afterward and we are very proud of him and support him with all this. He just feels that we should be inter-planetary, starting with Mars. Mars seems to be the most friendly [planet], and that is what he would like to explore. <cite>-Elon Musk’s mother Maye Musk, in an interview from Los Angeles with FORBES AFRICA last year about her memoir, A Woman Makes A Plan, released by Jonathan Ball Publishers</cite></blockquote>



Days later, with the swift rebound of Tesla shares by 4.7%, he wrestled the top spot from Bezos with an impressive recovery of $7.8 billion bringing his total net worth to $183.8 billion against the Amazon founder’s, marginal, but impressive, $182.4 billion.



At the time of going to press, the yo-yo action continued. Tesla’s stock volatility returned Bezos to the top spot, making him the world’s richest by just $200 million, with Musk making a close second. The game is set to continue for much of the year, but it won’t do much to change the fact that both billionaires are still over $30 billion richer than their nearest competitor; the third person on the list, French luxury tycoon, Bernard Arnault, according to Forbes estimates.



Musk’s dizzying ascent is quite an achievement given that, in 2014, he ranked 47th on the U.S. Rich List, compiled by Forbes, with his personal net worth hovering at the $9.4 billion mark, at contemporary rates.



Notwithstanding his meteoric rise, most studies of Musk begin at SpaceX, his landmark aerospace manufacturing outfit, launched in 2002 with plans to make space travel more affordable and meet its founder’s often parodied mandate to catalyze humanity’s colonization of Mars.



“I’d like to go to Mars. I suppose it depends on how old I am when I get there&#8230; But it’s not about me going to Mars. We’re developing new technologies to enable a large number of people to go to Mars and be able to develop a self-sustaining city on Mars,” he told Forbes in 2014.



Inter-planetary ambitions aside, Musk’s ideas often overshadow the story of his origins which are rooted in a very down-to-earth Pretoria suburb, a few miles north of Johannesburg, in South Africa. Born in 1971 to a Canadian mother and a South African father, it was clear that Musk was unique from the start.



“The kind of things he would come up with as a youngster was always surprising. When he was very small, he would ask me, ‘where is the whole world?’, when he was three or four. It was these sorts of questions that made me realize that he was a little different,” his father, Errol Musk, noted in a 2012 interview with FORBES AFRICA.



Eccentricities aside, the young Musk was equally academically gifted.



“We called Elon ‘The Encyclopedia’ because he had read the Encyclopaedia Britannica and Collier’s Encyclopedia, and remembered everything. That’s also why we called him ‘Genius Boy’. We could ask him anything. Remember, this was before the internet. I guess now we would call him ‘The Internet’,” his mother, Maye Musk, recalls in her 2019 autobiography, A Woman Makes a Plan.



Attending Pretoria Boys High School (PBHS), often considered one of the most prestigious schools in South Africa, a teenage Musk kept to himself but found plenty of company in computers. He taught himself how to program using an old manual and eventually sold a space-themed video game that he wrote called Blastar, to a computing magazine in 1984, reportedly for $500, arguably the earliest of his tech ventures.



“My impression is that Elon kept to himself and was relatively quiet and reserved. I believe he was involved with the computer club at school, but otherwise was not really visible in mainstream activities,” Gavin Ehlers, head-boy at PBHS in 1988, the same year Musk graduated, told FORBES AFRICA in 2012.



Yet, despite his remarkable talent and comfortable upbringing, Musk’s childhood was blighted with peculiar challenges. As the shortest, smallest, and smartest kid in the class, he was an easy target for bullies, who tormented him until he was 15 years old.



“I was a late bloomer. So I was the youngest and the smallest kid in class for years and years&#8230; The gangs at school would hunt me down – literally hunt me down,” Musk told Rolling Stone magazine in 2017.



At home, things weren’t easier. His parents divorced in 1980.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-large is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">If somebody else is working 50 hours and you’re working a 100, you’ll get twice as much done in the course of the year as the other company.</blockquote>



The tumult of his early life did much to shape the man that Musk would later become. Even as a youngster, he held strong to his principles. At the time, in apartheid South Africa, mandatory two-year military service was in force for all white males who had completed their secondary school or tertiary- level education. In his objection, Musk said he didn’t prescribe to what the state was doing to its citizens.



“I don’t have an issue with serving in the military per se, but serving in the South African army suppressing black people just didn’t seem like a really good way to spend time,” he explained in the 2007 book, Rocketeers, by Michael Belfiore.



At 17, Musk relocated to Canada to attend university in 1989. After a number of transfers, he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, part of the prominent Ivy League in the United States, with a dual degree in Economics and Physics, setting him firmly on the path of a tech entrepreneur. Like all the greats, he dropped out of his Ph.D. program at Stanford, instead of establishing his first startup, against the euphoria of the dot-com boom of the nineties. He founded the company, Zip2, with his younger brother, Kimbal – who has been a keen business partner to Musk throughout his entrepreneurial career – in 1995.



“When my brother and I were starting our first company, instead of getting an apartment we rented a small office and slept on the couch. We were so hard-up we had just one computer so the website was up during the day and I was coding at night. Seven days a week&#8230; all the time. I briefly had a girlfriend during that period and in order to be with me she had to sleep at the office,” he said with a smile, during a 2014 Commencement Speech at the University of Southern California (USC).



Hard work is a cornerstone of Musk’s entrepreneurial ethos. His constant refrain to anyone who inquires on his success is to outwork the competition, where possible, to get that all important edge.



“If somebody else is working 50 hours and you’re working a 100, you’ll get twice as much done in the course of the year as the other company,” he told the audience at USC.



Clearly, the hard work has paid off for Musk who joined the five-man centi-billionaires club; all with a net worth over $100 billion, in August 2020.



Members include Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and veteran tech titan, Bill Gates.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-large is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;Given that as a South African, he has managed to conquer the industry he’s in should be an inspiration to us and to Africa, in general. There are many sides to him&#8230; But let us draw inspiration from him because he is a product of the public school system in South Africa.&#8221; &#8211;Fred Khumalo, author and journalist, South Africa</blockquote>



However, it hasn’t been an easy ride to the top. In 2018, Tesla was in dire straits, the company was struggling to build a viable product and was hemorrhaging cash almost daily. Musk had already sunk a bulk of his early fortune in the business, some of which came from the $165 million sale of his stake in PayPal, the online payments pioneer, after his exit as CEO.



Leading the company during that time took a toll. In a very personal interview with The New York Times, Musk revealed that he was losing sleep and had spent most of his birthday working on the factory floor, where he was also spending most of his days and nights. The work had taken over to the point of almost missing Kimbal’s wedding, where he was the best man. A disheveled Musk admitted that while he regretted the havoc it wreaked on his life, he had no regrets about being so determined to pull Tesla from the brink of collapse.



“The worst is over from a Tesla operational standpoint. But from a personal pain standpoint&#8230; the worst is yet to come,” he told The New York Times.



Musk’s passion is evident in almost everything he has done, and in every business he has built. After leaving PayPal, and selling his stake in the company, he used a bulk of the $165 million fortune to found the companies that would make his name – SpaceX and Tesla. Any seasoned entrepreneur would have considered the move a risky one but Musk was quite adamant about his ambitions and making them a reality.



“I think there was like literally one week where I actually worked 120 hours and just didn’t leave the factory. I didn’t even go outside,” Musk told American television news magazine program, 60 Minutes, in 2018.



His intense work ethic has not only worked to transform Tesla but has inspired a number of other young entrepreneurs to build the electric car industry and get rich in the process.



For example, William Li, who founded electric car maker, Nio, in 2014, was 12 times richer in 2020 thanks to his shares in the U.S.-listed carmaker. In fact, he’s now among the world’s 500 richest people, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Chinese entrepreneur, He Xiaopeng, chairman of XPeng Motors, has also seen his wealth jump more than 600%. Overall, fortunes of the handful of people tracked by the Bloomberg index in the electric vehicle industry have gone up by over $140 billion including Musk’s $111 billion surge.



However, far removed from his status on the global billionaire league tables, which have come to form the foundation of his popularity, Musk maintains his very own niche but loyal following, all devoted to his Twitter feed; his preferred mode of communication. Muskians, as they are known, see him as an eclectic superhero figure of the modern age where he is at once a conscientious technology entrepreneur and demi-god.



However, in 2020, following statements made on the impact the Trump administration’s Covid-19 policy responses had on his business, Musk received heavy back- lash from the mainstream and even managed to alienate some of his loyal fans. But all is forgotten now that the South African-born entrepreneur is among the world’s richest men.



While his wealth may be a relentless conversation starter, globally, it’s hard to ignore Musk’s legacy in the business arena. The journey from a quiet, intelligent and passionate young entrepreneur to an influential manufacturing magnate has been driven not just by a belief in hard work but by an ability to settle for dreams beyond the stars.



For generations to come, his place in time will always be confirmed by his commitment to not only conjure up ‘moonshot’ ideas but to actively pursue them; to Mars and back.



&#8211;BY MARIE SHABAYA



Get Your Copy Of FORBES AFRICA <a href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/product/single-digital-issue-the-billionaires-list-feb-march-2021/">here</a>



<div class="wp-block-image is-style-default"><figure class="alignleft size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-793x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-49836" width="285" height="367" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-793x1024.jpg 793w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-232x300.jpg 232w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-768x991.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-1190x1536.jpg 1190w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-1586x2048.jpg 1586w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-300x387.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-600x775.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FA-OFC-2021-Feb_March-scaled.jpg 1983w" sizes="(max-width: 285px) 100vw, 285px" /></figure></div>

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Rockets To Riches: The Rise And Rise Of Elon Musk

TOPLINE Amazon founder Jeff Bezos announced Tuesday he will step aside as CEO of the e-commerce giant to serve as executive chairman, a move he said will give him more time to focus on his other “passions.” Here are the causes Bezos said he’ll dedicate time to.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h4>



In a Tuesday&nbsp;<a href="https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/email-from-jeff-bezos-to-employees" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">letter to Amazon employees</a>, Bezos said said he’ll use his new free time to focus on The Day One Fund, the $2 billion fund he&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2018/09/13/jeff-bezos-amazon-philanthropy-giving-billion-dollar-fund/?sh=743df02d1570">established in 2018</a>&nbsp;aimed at opening full-scholarship, Montessori-influenced preschools in underserved communities and funding nonprofits that support homeless families.



He also said he’ll work on the Bezos Earth Fund, which he kicked off a year ago with a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2018/09/13/jeff-bezos-amazon-philanthropy-giving-billion-dollar-fund/?sh=743df02d1570">$10 billion pledge</a>&nbsp;(almost 10% of his net worth at the time) to combat climate change by issuing grants to “scientists, activists, NGOs—any effort that offers a real possibility to help&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/02/17/jeff-bezos-pledges-to-fight-climate-change-with-10-billion-earth-fund/?sh=79b4fb8b523b">preserve and protect the natural world</a>,” Bezos said.



Bezos also has Blue Origin, his&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanocallaghan/2021/01/14/blue-origin-launches-and-lands-its-first-space-tourism-rocket-of-the-year-with-human-flights-in-sight/?sh=12878c37283e">private spaceflight company</a>, which is developing rockets for commercial space tourism that he hinted could help NASA&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2019/05/09/jeff-bezos-unveils-blue-origins-lunar-lander-announces-new-glenn-first-launch-for-2021/?sh=224700a7435a">take humans to the Moon</a>.



The billionaire said he’ll also dedicate more time to&nbsp;The Washington Post,&nbsp;which he purchased for&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2013/08/05/jeff-bezos-buys-washington-post-for-250-million-less-than-1-of-his-net-worth/?sh=39ccde84331b">$250 million</a>&nbsp;in 2013, and helped to expand its digital presence and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/16/media/jeff-bezos-donald-graham/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ramp up revenue</a>.



Crucial quote



“I will stay engaged in important Amazon initiatives but also have the time and energy I need to focus on &#8230; my other passions. I’ve never had more energy, and this isn’t about retiring. I’m super passionate about the impact I think these organizations can have,” Bezos said in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/email-from-jeff-bezos-to-employees" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">the letter</a>&nbsp;Tuesday.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h4>



Bezos founded Amazon, which started out as an online bookstore, in 1994 out of his garage in Seattle. Now Amazon is one of the biggest companies in the world, and operates ventures in streaming, entertainment, groceries, delivery and more. Bezos is worth&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/02/02/jeff-bezos-to-step-down-as-amazon-ceo/?sh=394328711e5d">$196.4 billion</a>, according to Forbes. Amazon announced Tuesday Bezo would&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/02/02/jeff-bezos-to-step-down-as-amazon-ceo/?sh=394328711e5d">step down as CEO</a>&nbsp;and be replaced by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelsandler/2021/02/02/what-you-need-to-know-about-andy-jassy-amazons-new-ceo/">Andy Jassy</a>, who leads Amazon Web Services.



<h4 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h4>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahhansen/2021/02/02/jeff-bezos-to-step-down-as-amazon-ceo/?sh=394328711e5d">Jeff Bezos To Step Down As Amazon CEO</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelsandler/2021/02/02/what-you-need-to-know-about-andy-jassy-amazons-new-ceo/">What You Need To Know About Andy Jassy, Amazon’s New CEO</a> (Forbes)



By Carlie Porterfield, Forbes Staff

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Attends Amazon’s Annual Smbhav Event In Delhi

Here’s What’s Next For Jeff Bezos After He Steps Down As Amazon CEO

Key Speakers and Interviews at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum

The Forbes Billionaires’ List: Africa’s Richest People 2021

Tesla billionaire Elon Musk is the richest person in the world once again, overtaking Jeff Bezos as shares of Amazon fell on Thursday.



Amazon’s stock fell 1.2%, lowering Bezos’ net worth by $2 billion, to $182.8 billion. Shares of electric-vehicle maker Tesla, on the other hand, lost 1.1% on Thursday, pushing Musk’s net worth down by $1.8 billion.&nbsp;



Musk is now worth $182.9 billion, which again makes him the wealthiest person on the planet, according to&nbsp;Forbes’&nbsp;estimates. The Tesla chief is now just less than $1 billion richer than Bezos, who falls to second-richest person in the world.



The two billionaires have spent much of the last week competing for the title of wealthiest person on the planet. Musk took the number one spot from Bezos&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2021/01/08/elon-musk-is-now-the-richest-person-in-the-world-officially-surpassing-jeff-bezos/">last Friday</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2021/01/12/elon-musk-is-back-at-no-1-richest-person-in-the-world-after-tesla-stock-rebounds/?sh=4352d8de6c68">again on Tuesday</a>,&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;calculates.&nbsp;



Both billionaires are over $30 billion richer than the world’s third-wealthiest person, LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault, who is worth $149.4 billion,&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;estimates.



Musk’s net worth has grown at an astonishing rate over the last year, rising more than $150 billion since March 2020, when he was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/">worth $24.6 billion</a>. Bezos’ fortune has also continued to grow, though not as fast: He’s up from $113 billion in March 2020.

Elon Musk Is The Richest Person In The World—Again

Despite seeing his net worth skyrocket in recent months—and a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-06/musk-close-to-surpassing-bezos-as-world-s-richest-person#:~:text=Elon%20Musk%2C%20the%20outspoken%20entrepreneur,the%20world's%20500%20wealthiest%20people." target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">report</a>&nbsp;from Bloomberg on Wednesday that he’s now the world’s richest person—<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/?list=rtb/">Elon Musk</a>&nbsp;remains the second-richest person in the world, according to&nbsp;Forbes’ estimates.



Shares of Musk’s electric-vehicle maker Tesla&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/tesla" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">TSLA</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/tesla">+6.9%</a>&nbsp;rose by 7% as of 2:30 p.m. EST on Thursday, pushing Musk’s net worth up by $9.8 billion, to $175.2 billion. That makes him $22 billion richer than the planet’s third-wealthiest person, French luxury tycoon&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/bernard-arnault/?list=rtb/">Bernard Arnault</a>, but still $11 billion behind the world’s number one, Amazon&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/amazon" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">AMZN</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/amazon">+1.8%</a>&nbsp;CEO&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/jeff-bezos/?list=rtb/">Jeff Bezos</a>.&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;estimates that Bezos has a net worth of $186.8 billion.



Musk’s net worth has grown at an astronomical clip over the past year. He has added nearly $150 billion to his fortune since March 2020, when he was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/">worth $24.6 billion</a>. Much of that increase comes from Tesla’s skyrocketing share price, which rose more than 720% in 2020. It has gained another 10% so far over the first week of 2021.&nbsp;



As Tesla’s stock soared ahead of its inclusion in the S&amp;P 500 Index on December 21, Musk surpassed Facebook&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/facebook" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">FB</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/facebook">+1.9%</a>&nbsp;CEO&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/mark-zuckerberg/?list=rtb/">Mark Zuckerberg</a>&nbsp;(who is worth $98.2 billion today) to become the world’s fourth-richest person in early November, then leapfrogged Microsoft&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/microsoft" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">MSFT</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/microsoft">+3%</a>&nbsp;cofounder&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/bill-gates/?list=rtb/">Bill Gates</a>&nbsp;(worth $121.9 billion today) for the number three spot.



Musk owns around 21% of Tesla’s shares, plus a stake in private rocket company SpaceX. Tesla stock still sits at record highs, now trading for over $800 per share. The company’s $765 billion market cap makes it by far the most valuable car company in the world.



-By Sergei Klebnikov, Forbes Staff

No, Elon Musk Is Not The Richest Person In The World—Yet

The SPAC boom—a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoinegara/2020/11/19/the-looming-spac-meltdown/?sh=7c2c083570d7">money faucet</a>&nbsp;for Wall Street, and a big potential hazard for retail investors—has minted another winner on the inside of a deal.&nbsp;



Eric Wu, cofounder and CEO of Opendoor, became a billionaire on Monday, the day the home-buying firm began trading through a merger with&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/noahkirsch/2020/09/15/home-buyer-opendoor-is-officially-going-public-in-48-billion-deal/?sh=da7adbd134fe">a SPAC</a>&nbsp;called Social Capital Hedosophia Holdings II. At the close of markets, his 6% stake in the firm was worth $1.01 billion. It is unclear whether he will remain a billionaire at the end of after-hours trading.



Wu, 37, published a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.opendoor.com/w/blog/moving-forward-together" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">blog post</a>&nbsp;on Monday morning celebrating the deal. “In 2014, a small group of us dreamt of a future where you could buy and sell a home at the tap of a button,” he wrote. “Like most startups, we’ve faced our fair share of hard problems, but we believed in the potential impact of what we were building and put in the hard work to tackle obstacle after obstacle.”



Through a spokesperson, Wu declined to comment for this article.



Opendoor is the leading business in the “iBuying” market, a relatively nascent industry that lets homeowners quickly offload their houses to the company, which then lists them on its platform. Opendoor uses algorithms to determine how much it pays—too little, and potential customers won’t want to sell; too high and the company could take a loss.&nbsp;



Last year, Opendoor sold nearly 19,000 homes, generating revenue of $4.7 billion, though it posted a net loss of $339 million. Sales dropped off dramatically this year, likely in part due to the pandemic. Through the end of September, revenue fell to $2.3 billion (more than $1 billion less than the same period in 2019), while losses amounted to $199 million.&nbsp;



Those losses, while trending in the right direction, have raised questions about Opendoor’s long-term path to profitability. The company, for its part, says it’s willing to lose money in the near future as it battles for market share. “Five years ago, we were in like two markets, three markets,” cofounder Ian Wong told&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;this fall. “Today we’re in 21.”&nbsp;



iBuying remains a wide open field, even as Opendoor competes with Zillow, Redfin, Offerpad and other startups.&nbsp;<a href="https://therealdeal.com/2020/09/14/hungry-for-cash-opendoor-eyes-ipo/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">According to</a>&nbsp;The Real Deal, the industry still comprises just 0.5% of the $1.6 trillion home-buying market.



Investors clearly aren’t spooked. When Opendoor’s public offering was first announced in September, the company had an enterprise value of $4.8 billion. By Monday morning, its market value stood at nearly $18 billion.&nbsp;



Opendoor joins other newly public tech firms with soaring stock prices, including Airbnb, DoorDash, and Snowflake. Will those gains last? Time will tell, but the valuations sure look lofty.



By Noah Kirsch, Forbes Staff

Key Speakers At Techonomy 2018 Conference

New Billionaire: Opendoor’s Public Debut Is A Big Win For CEO Eric Wu

<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/mackenzie-scott/?sh=3f994da8243d">MacKenzie Scott</a>&nbsp;— the ex-wife of Jeff Bezos — announced Tuesday that she’s donated more than $4.1 billion over the past four months to nearly 400 organizations helping fulfill basic needs for many Americans struggling in the pandemic.



“This pandemic has been a wrecking ball in the lives of Americans already struggling,” Scott writes. “Economic losses and health outcomes alike have been worse for women, for people of color, and for people living in poverty. Meanwhile, it has substantially increased the wealth of billionaires.”



Scott, who received one-quarter of her ex-husband’s Amazon stock in their divorce settlement in 2019, is the third richest woman in the world, behind L’Oreal heir&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/francoise-bettencourt-meyers/?list=rtb/&amp;sh=438656d52b06">Francoise Bettencourt Meyers</a>&nbsp;and Walmart heir&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/alice-walton/?list=rtb/&amp;sh=1d36b6614eb2">Alice Walton</a>. Scott is worth an estimated $55.1 billion, according to&nbsp;Forbes’&nbsp;calculations, after taking into account her newest charitable giving.



In a&nbsp;<a href="https://medium.com/@mackenzie_scott/384-ways-to-help-45d0b9ac6ad8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">post on Medium</a>, Scott, a novelist, said she and her team had vetted hundreds of organizations in recent months and ultimately donated $4.158 billion to 384 groups, which she named and linked to in her post. Recipients include community colleges and universities like Blackfeet Community College in Montana; food banks and meal providers like Feeding America, America’s Second Harvest and Meals on Wheels; and many individual YMCAs and YWCAs.



Scott also says that her gifts to these organizations are unrestricted, meaning that were not earmarked for certain initiatives. That allows the recipients to use the money however they best see fit.



“Not only are non-profits chronically underfunded, they are also chronically diverted from their work by fundraising, and by burdensome reporting requirements that donors often place on them,” she writes. By freeing nonprofit groups of that burden, she hopes the organizations can focus on their primary work —meeting the needs of those they serve.&nbsp;



That sits particularly well with YMCA of the USA, which received a $20 million donation from Scott. Local YMCAs received additional donations. Many YMCAs have been providing childcare to families of first responders and essential workers during the pandemic. But the YMCA says it’s faced a revenue drop of $1 billion across the organization since the pandemic started. So the gift is much needed.



“We are incredibly grateful to MacKenzie Scott for her generous gifts made to 43 YMCA associations and YMCA of the USA,” said Kevin Washington, president and CEO, YMCA of the USA. “Ms. Scott’s gifts are a testament to the trust Ys have earned by meeting pressing social needs in the communities the Y serves across the country. These unrestricted funds are especially important to the work of Ys to support communities during the COVID-19 pandemic.”



In May 2019, Scott&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddawkins/2019/05/28/mackenzie-bezos-will-donate-half-her-fortune-to-giving-pledge/?sh=c23098931d89">signed the Giving Pledge</a>&nbsp;— a promise to give away at least half of her fortune to charitable organizations&nbsp;either during her lifetime or after she dies. In July this year, Scott&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2020/07/28/mackenzie-bezos-announces-nearly-17-billion-in-charitable-giftsand-shes-changed-her-last-name/?sh=3ab8650b6dfb">announced</a>, also through a&nbsp;<a href="https://medium.com/@mackenzie_scott/116-organizations-driving-change-67354c6d733d" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Medium post</a>, that she had donated nearly $1.7 billion to 116 charitable groups. It was her first large round of philanthropic giving. She also used the post to declare that she had changed her last name from Bezos to Scott (which was her middle name). Altogether, Scott’s announced gifts to charitable and nonprofit groups this year total $5.8 billion.&nbsp;



Jeff Bezos, still&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/jeff-bezos/?sh=16b6d9061b23">the world’s richest person</a>, has not signed the Giving Pledge, though he has stepped up his charitable giving this year. In April, he announced<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2020/04/02/jeff-bezos-announces-100-million-gift-to-nonprofit-feeding-america/?sh=ea02bb61818f">&nbsp;a $100 million gif</a>t to Feeding America, which works with food banks across the country. In February, Bezos&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/02/17/jeff-bezos-pledges-to-fight-climate-change-with-10-billion-earth-fund/?sh=1220fb1523bc">pledged $10 billion</a>&nbsp;over an unspecified period of time toward solving climate change. As part of that pledge, in mid November he announced nearly<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2020/11/16/jeff-bezos-announces-nearly-800million-in-donations-to-climate-change-organizations/?sh=3b945e7d2b7b">&nbsp;$800 million in grants</a>&nbsp;to 16 groups working to fight climate change.



Editor’s note, 7:30 pm ET December 15, 2020: This post was updated to clarify that the $20 million donation from Scott went to YMCA of the USA, while local YMCAs received additional donations. The article previously incorrectly implied that the $20 million donation was split among all the YMCAs.



by Kerry A. Dolan, Forbes Staff

Tag: Billionaire

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