15 Business Tycoons Join $100 Billion Club for 1st Time in History

Taarek Refaat

It was imagined until 2017 that $100 billion was a legendary number that could be read in the budgets of countries, until it had become an achievable reality when Amazon co-founder Jeff Bezos confirmed reaching this mark in wealth, which Bill Gates had preceded him before the "dot-com" crisis in 1999,

Even Bill Gates's wealth did not last long, after the decline of technology stocks following the explosion of the dot-com bubble, and this club remained without members for decades, but the quick solutions of technology, and the huge amount of wealth it created for its owners, created special memberships within the originally rare club.

In 2021, the CEO of Tesla broke all previous records, and not only became the richest man in the world, but he also took the boundaries of wealth to new areas after his wealth exceeded $300 billion.

Despite warnings of a potential stock market collapse, according to the author of "Rich Dad, Poor Dad", fears of a US economic recession, and the Federal Reserve's delay in responding by cutting interest rates, billionaires' fortunes continued to grow strongly over the past week, bringing the total number of members of the $100 billion club to 15 people for the first time in history.

The previous number was 14 people last April, according to the Forbes index.

Last Friday, the Spaniard Amancio Ortega, who owns a 59% stake in the world's largest clothing retailer "Zara" joined the list after his wealth rose by $2.86 billion to $102 billion.

Ortega, 88, had no published photos other than a photo of his local ID card until 1999.

The $100 billion club has added $340.7 billion to its wealth since the start of the year, with the figure weighed down by a decline in the wealth of French billionaire Bernard Arnault by about $15.6 billion.

Here's the list of the $100 billion club:

Elon Musk ($241 billion)

Jeff Bezos ($200 billion)

Bernard Arnault ($192 billion)

Mark Zuckerberg ($187 billion)

Bill Gates ($158 billion)

Larry Ellison ($152 billion)

Larry Page ($147 billion)

Steve Ballmer ($145 billion)

Warren Buffett ($140 billion)

Sergey Brin ($138 billion)

Mukesh Ambani ($111 billion)