Top 10 billionaires make nearly $64B in post-Trump election stock surge

Yesterday's stock market bounce after the election of Donald Trump has added billions to the pockets of the tech elite, although apparently Mark Zuckerberg failed to cash in.

According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the top 10 wealthiest people on the planet saw a total increase of nearly $64 billion in their combined net worth yesterday, with Elon Musk the biggest winner, adding $26.5 billion to his personal fortune of $290 billion.

Larry Ellison made nearly $10 billion over the day, and Oracle itself is likely to benefit from the new administration in terms of contracts.

Only two of the top 10 billionaires lost money during the boom. Bernard Arnault, chairman and CEO of luxury goods empire LVMH, saw his net worth fall $2.85 billion, after already being down $34.3 billion over the past year. As the only non-techie in the top 10 list, he has only $173 billion in net worth to fall back on.

But the surprising other loser was the third-richest man on the top 10 list (and they're all men - Alice Walton is currently the highest-ranked woman on the list, at 16th) is Metaverse enthusiast Mark Zuckerberg.

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Zuck is down $80.9 million on the day, though that's a small dent in his $202 billion fortune. Meta's shares were up but he has other investments, and the president-elect isn't a fan of the Facebook founder and has threatened to have "Zuckerbucks" imprisoned over perceived election fraud.

Here's the top 10 in full:

• 1. Elon Musk $290 billion, up $26.5 billion.
• 2. Jeff Bezos $228 billion, up $7.14 billion.
• 3. Mark Zuckerberg $202 billion, down $80.9 million.
• 4. Larry Ellison $193 billion, up $9.88 billion.
• 5. Bernard Arnault $173 billion, down $2.85 billion.
• 6. Bill Gates $159 billion, up $1.82 billion.
• 7. Larry Page $158 billion, up $5.53 billion.
• 8. Sergey Brin $149 billion, up $5.17 billion.
• 9. Warren Buffett $148 billion, up $7.58 billion.
• 10. Steve Ballmer $146 billion, up $2.81 billion.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos (second on the list at $228 billion) quickly praised Trump after the election win was announced. Apple's Tim Cook was encouraging too, as did Microsoft's Satya Nadella, Google's Sundar Pichai joined the praise party for Trump as well.

Incidentally, those last three don't even make it to the top 500 richest people on the planet - which shows the difference between being a founder and being the hired help.

Overall, the top 10 have seen their collective net worth increase by $346.3 billion year-on-year, even accounting for Arnault's $34.3 billion loss over the last 12 months. ®