Jeff Bezos is the new world’s richest person, possessing a net worth of more than $90 billion.
Bezos overtook Bill Gates on Thursday after Amazon shares surged to a new high of $1,071.30. Bezos, according to CNBC, owns 80 million shares of the online retailer he founded and runs. The new surge, if it holds, will add $800 million to his net worth.
Bezos now sits atop Bloomberg’s billionaire index, above other Americans billionaires like investor Warren Buffet and Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Part of Bezos’s ascent to the top of the list comes from Bill Gates’s philanthropic giving. The billionaire has given away $32.9 billion throughout his life to charitable causes.
Amazon’s dominance across markets and vigorous growth strategy have helped establish its stock as go-to for investors, catapulting its shares from $237 five years ago to the $1,070 it’s currently hovering at.
Amazon is currently facing some scrutiny from regulators over its pending acquisition of Whole Foods. Experts in the space, however, don’t expect the federal government to hold up the roughly $13.7 billion deal or for it to create antitrust concerns at the Department of Justice.
