Elon Musk, the chief executive officer and lead designer of SpaceX, seeks to improve and speed up the world's transition to a future with sustainable energy. Such a noble pursuit comes with its perks.
The self-made technology entrepreneur has an approximate real-time net worth of $19.5 billion, as of May 15. This warrants him the 40th spot in Forbes' billionaires list. Moreover, CNBC posits that Musk's net worth is $23.6 billion; however, no time frame was supplied.
Although he is one of the most famous billionaires in technology development and one of the most covered billionaires in the media, his exact wealth is still uncertain. This is mostly because he leads such an un-billionaire type of life.
Musk, who is also the co-founder and chief executive officer of Tesla Inc., does not actually have a guaranteed multimillion dollar salary yearly with stock options from Tesla Inc. Musk uses the salaries and perks received from his other companies such as Neuralink, The Boring Company, and OpenAl. And it was noted that the $56,000 monthly salary he gets from Tesla Inc. has not been drawn, not even once.
And this is why it is difficult to name the exact amount of his wealth.
Earlier this year, Tesla released a statement announcing that the company will not pay Musk anything for the next decade or so. This means he will no longer be receiving any salary, bonus, or stocks for the time being.
He will only start getting those back once the company reaches its goal market cap of $100 billion. The company's market cap as of May 15 is estimated to be at about $41 billion still.
Financial specialists theorize that, if and when Musk successfully leads Tesla to that $100 billion goal and the stock value increases within that time frame, it could allow him to net about $50 billion. That would mean Musk could soon nab the title as richest man in the world and replace Jeff Bezos.
However, despite the fact that he will not be profiting off Tesla for the next ten years, the company agreed to award him $2.6 billion dollars in stocks for compensation and in addition to the $50 billion or so he could make.
According to Forbes, Bezos, who is the founder and chief executive officer of Amazon, has a real-time net worth of $152 billion as of May 15. But a big percent of this stupendous amount will go to Bezos' ex-wife, as agreed on in their divorce settlement.
