00:00 Here's your Forbes daily briefing for Sunday, March 3rd.
00:05 Today on Forbes, the top 10 richest people in the world, March 2024.
00:12 Forbes has been keeping track of the world's billionaires since 1987.
00:17 Last year we found 2,640 of them for our annual list.
00:21 Throughout the year, we update their fortunes on a daily basis.
00:25 Many billionaires hold much of their net worth in the stock of the company they founded or co-founded.
00:31 As that stock price moves, their fortune moves along with it.
00:35 The reporting in this story and the numbers cited are as of Friday, March 1st, 2024, at 12am ET.
00:44 You might remember that billionaire Elon Musk lost his title as world's richest person in January,
00:49 as shares of his electric car maker Tesla slid and a judge in Delaware voided Musk's $51 billion pay package,
00:56 leading Forbes to discount his package of options.
01:00 While his fortune has now rebounded above $200 billion, from $182.6 billion, he's still at number two.
01:08 But he's closed the gap between him and the richest person on earth, luxury goods tycoon Bernard Arnault of France.
01:15 Arnault had a very good month, adding $19 billion to his net worth, now at $229.8 billion,
01:23 but not quite as good as Musk, whose fortune jumped $27 billion to $209.7 billion.
01:31 Neither had as good a month, though, as Mark Zuckerberg, whose fortune rose by nearly $35 billion,
01:38 the biggest gain of any of the top ten richest.
01:41 This was thanks to a big jump in the price of Meta's stock.
01:44 It was enough to move Zuckerberg to number four in the world, up from number five in February,
01:49 switching spots with Oracle's Larry Ellison.
01:52 Zuckerberg's net worth is now $172.3 billion.
01:57 Larry Ellison, now at number five, is worth $139.4 billion.
02:04 Mukesh Ambani of India returned to the top ten for the first time since February 2022,
02:11 replacing Google co-founder Sergey Brin at number ten.
02:15 His Reliance Industries, which had recently spun off its financial services arm,
02:19 hit an all-time high on February 15th.
02:22 On February 28th, Disney announced that it would merge its operations in India
02:26 with Ambani's Reliance Industries in an $8.5 billion deal.
02:32 Ambani is worth $114.4 billion as of midnight on March 1st.
02:38 Nine of the world's top ten richest people are wealthier than they were a month ago.
02:43 Together, they are worth a combined $1.56 trillion, $115 billion more than a month ago.
02:53 At number three is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, with a net worth of $195.5 billion.
03:01 In July 2017, Bezos overtook Bill Gates to become the richest person in the world.
03:06 Bezos was the world's richest person on Forbes' list of the world's billionaires from 2018 through 2021.
03:13 During February 2024, his fortune rose by $18 billion as the result of an uptick in Amazon shares.
03:21 Rounding out the top ten are some familiar names.
03:25 Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, and Larry Page.
03:30 For full coverage and to see the whole list in detail, check out the Forbes Wealth Teams piece on Forbes.com.
03:38 This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes. Thanks for tuning in.
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