Elon Musk halfway to becoming world’s first trillionaire

Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has become the first person to reach a net worth of $500 billion, according to Forbes.

The Tesla and SpaceX chief briefly hit $500.1 billion on Wednesday before his wealth dipped to $499.1 billion, Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaires tracker showed.

The milestone comes as Tesla shares rebound after a turbulent period, alongside gains from Musk’s other ventures.

Musk, 54, is now seen as being nearly halfway to becoming the world’s first trillionaire. Behind him on the Forbes list are Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison with $350.7 billion and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg with $245.8 billion.

Musk made his first fortune in 1999 when he sold an online publishing software firm to Compaq for more than $300 million.

He later co-founded a company that merged with PayPal before launching SpaceX in 2002. He joined Tesla in 2004 as chairman and later became its CEO.