Forbes released its annual list of the world’s richest people and, unsurprisingly, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk, worth $219 billion, topped the list of the billionaires, with Jeff Bezos coming in at number two with $171 billion.
According to Forbes’ 36th-annual ranking of the planet’s richest people, 2,668 made it to the list this year, 87 fewer than a year ago. Forbes cited wars, COVID and the sluggish markets being the reasons for this decline.
Here's this year's definitive list of the World's Billionaires: https://t.co/UcFKZr1Ky3 #ForbesBillionaires pic.twitter.com/noTOhpYJ9t
— Forbes (@Forbes) April 5, 2022
The most dramatic drops occurred in Russia, where there were 34 fewer billionaires than last year following Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, and China, where a government crackdown on tech companies had led to 87 fewer Chinese billionaires on the list.
However, the United States still leads the list of countries with the most billionaires, with 735 billionaires worth a collective $4.7 trillion, including Elon Musk, who topped the Forbes list for the first time.
The list also marked the entrance of 236 newcomers who had become billionaires over the past year, including the first-ever billionaires from Barbados, Bulgaria, Estonia and Uruguay.
