Elon Musk's Net Worth Falls Below $200 Billion as Tesla Investors Dump Shares Following Twitter Deal

Elon Musk's net worth dropped below $200 billion (roughly Rs. 16,31,070 crore) on Tuesday as investors dumped Tesla shares on fears the top executive and largest shareholder of the world's most valuable electric-vehicle maker is more preoccupied with Twitter. Musk now has a net worth of $194.8 billion (roughly Rs. 15,87,840 crore), according to Forbes, with a big share of that coming from his nearly 15 percent stake in Tesla, which has a market value of $622 billion (roughly Rs. 50,69,380 crore).

Tesla company has lost nearly half its market value and his net worth has dropped by $70 billion (roughly Rs. 5,700 crore) since he bid for Twitter in April.

Investors initially fled Tesla on worries over share sale by Musk, who has divested at least $15 billion (roughly Rs. 1,22,270 crore) worth of stock. He closed the $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,58,650 crore) deal last month with $13 billion (roughly Rs. 1,05,970 crore) in loans and a $33.5 billion (roughly Rs. 2,73,070 crore) equity commitment.

Now Wall Street fears that Musk has stretched himself too thin at a time when the EV maker is ramping up production and faces rising competition.

"It seems like Elon Musk is spending 100 percent of the time on Twitter and you know, it might need more capital," said Jay Hatfield at Infrastructure Capital.

Since buying Twitter, Musk has made very few tweets on Tesla, a practice that helped him gain traction on the platform. He has instead used Twitter to announce plans for the social media company such as the $8 (roughly Rs. 660) per month subscription for blue tick verification.

The net worth of the world's richest person, who also owns rocket company SpaceX, is roughly $40 billion (roughly Rs. 3,26,050 crore) more than the second richest person, LVMH-owner Bernard Arnault.

Tesla shares were down 2 percent at $193.7 (roughly Rs. 15,790) in afternoon trading, falling for a third straight session.

© Thomson Reuters 2022