Summary

Since Trump’s second-term inauguration, five top billionaires have lost a combined $209 billion as markets react to policy uncertainty.

  • Elon Musk’s net worth plunged $148 billion as Tesla shares collapsed amid declining European and Chinese sales.

  • Jeff Bezos lost $29 billion as Amazon stock fell 14%.

  • Sergey Brin’s fortune dropped $22 billion following Alphabet’s weak earnings and regulatory pressure.

  • Mark Zuckerberg and Bernard Arnault each lost $5 billion as Meta and LVMH stocks tumbled.

The S&P 500 is down 6.4%, reversing gains seen post-election.

Non-paywall link

    • Also only meaningful if they can’t buy up actual, tangible assets in the coming recessions, effectively converting their dead capital into more assets. (+ getting more state money for being “too big to fail”)

      • conditional_soup@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        No, they’re gonna. It’s exactly what happened last recession. The pain got offshored to the workers, and the people with assets used the moment to leverage their assets to buy more assets on the cheap.

        • NeonNight@lemm.ee
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          2 days ago

          Yep, every time the US is in an economic low period, the top 1% snatch up swathes of assets for cheap. It’s how we went from 1 billionaire, to several, then several billionaires to hundreds in the last ~20 years

        • errer@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          These companies will absolutely use these things as excuses to replace workers with AI chatbots.

      • ivanafterall ☑️@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Very similar to what happened just before the “collapse” of the Soviet Union, which seems to be Trump’s aspiration. It had turned into a free-for-all.

    • danc4498@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Stocks will always bounce back. But the people that live off their 401ks now have to sell at a loss to survive.

  • redlemace@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    So what? It’s not like their bank accounts got affected. Their shares are valued less which means they did not loose money but the lost money they could have had.

    • snooggums@lemmy.world
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      They lost pretend money that could be used for business loans that they don’t need because they have so much pretend money. The only time it matteds for these parasites is if it happens when they are acquiring another company worth billions of pretend monies.

      Even a stock market collapse is a benefit to these chucklefucks.

      • AbidanYre@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        The only time it matters for them is when an Italian plumber shows up to collect their debt.

      • henfredemars@infosec.pub
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        2 days ago

        Everything‘s on discount for them now! Time to buy up some cheap stock and failing businesses.

        They win no matter what.

        • Kyouki@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          Always stood by for, with (fake) money you can make more (fake) money.

          The issue is mostly getting towards that money first for us normies who aren’t born into RNG.

    • Captain Janeway@lemmy.world
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      They basically use that “money” as collateral for low interest loans. So it impacts how much they can physically buy. It’s a good thing.

    • freebee@sh.itjust.works
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      Some of them (ahum you know which one) did lose actual value: the entire credibility of their biggest brands are down the drain for years to come… In that way the stockprices do really show that they are losing out. Some others really are losing (sort of) equal access to big important markets… The loss is real, even tho I agree with the sentiment of your post, the lowering stocks predict lowering income, lowering dividends which these people expect to rake in eternally to keep their billionaire lifestyle afloat, etc. They are slowly becoming less wealthy from the shennanigans. Not quick enough tho. A billionaire is a thing that just shouldn’t be allowed to exist ever anywhere.

    • buddascrayon@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Yes, the more they lose the more we win.

      PERSONAL AUSTERITY!!! SAVE YOUR MONEY AND LET THE RICH GO FUCK THEMSELVES!!!

      • piratekaiser@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        You don’t win by them just losing some money. Redistribution is the name of the game. Even if Tesla hits 0/share, you aren’t getting any more wealth just by virtue of that happening.

        …Aside from basking in the downfall of a nazi of course, but those are priceless things.

        • buddascrayon@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          The win is the diminishment of his economical power. Same goes for Amazon and Meta. Transitioning off of any dependence of those websites and services will empower us and remove these shitheads’ influence.

  • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Coverage like this makes me feel sad.

    Do people honestly not realise that billionaires always enrich themselves during recessions?

    This is all going to plan for oligarchs. People celebrating it are naive unfortunately.

    • kameecoding@lemmy.world
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      I would say most of it is meaningless other than Elon and specifically Tesla, Tesla stock prices plumetting will remove most of the power from Elon in the future, even Trump might turn on him once his main thing his net worth evaporates

      • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Musk is only a part of the problem, and Musk will have to lose another 110 billion before he even stops being the richest man in the world.

        I’d love to see that happen but I’m not holding my breath. Meanwhile it does nothing but enrich powerful Disaster capitalists including Putin and his coterie.

      • PresidentCamacho@lemm.ee
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        2 days ago

        Id be willing to bet that tesla is no bigger than 10% maximum of his worth. His big ones are space X that just chugs our tax money, and starlink, which I believe is being used as navigation in weapons systems being sold to nations. Tesla is effectively meaningless now.

        • kameecoding@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          I think you are wrong in the exact opposite direction, spaced just lost a 25 billion contract too

    • Phoenicianpirate@lemm.ee
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      Them losing billions is meaningless. Don’t for this: if you had 1 billion dollars, and you lost 99% of it, you still have 10 million dollars, which is more than what most people will ever have.

      Their entire industries need to be nationalized and ALL their assets seized.

  • ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.com
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    2 days ago

    It remains to be seen if their kissing the ring was strategic or just tactical (apart from Musk, who is committed), but what they’ve bought wasn’t a good economy. They bought into the transition from democracy and capitalism to authoritarian oligarchy.

    Dollars don’t describe the value of Russia-level corruption, which is where the country is now pointed. And the longer-term gains from captured institutions would far outpace a hundred billion dollars or two, if they succeed.

    • DokPsy@lemmy.world
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      Small but important point. We’ve been an oligarchy for a while now. We’re just losing the pretense of it being a democracy.

  • limer@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    2 days ago

    Comparing my net worth to that total net worth? I’d be upset, but not terribly so, if I lost $1000 too.

    But since I would be getting it back later, and then some, it’s more like a small investment only . Definitely worth the small risk,

    • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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      Not really. Comparative wealth of the entire USA is declining, the Billionaires are still on top. If Elon Musk loses 99% of his wealth he would still be a billionaire.

      What this really means is that people around the world outside of the USA no longer view it as a stable investment.

  • MochiGoesMeow@lemmy.zip
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    2 days ago

    I know were in for a world of pain with the stocks tanking. But honestly don’t mind that they lose even more. Lose everything. Burn with us.

  • AreaKode@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    They don’t care. Stock prices only matter when purchasing and when selling. The day to day up and down has no affect on their direct worth.

    • wildncrazyguy138@fedia.io
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      False - these billionaires use their stock as collateral for loans. It’s all part of a tax avoidance scheme. If the stock goes down significantly, the banks come knocking.

      Both of the billionaires pictured also head their companies in some way or another. Investors can vote to throw them out. Not that they would, but even the vote of no confidence is not a good look.

      • Rhaedas@fedia.io
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        Banks may come to them, but hardly knocking with demands. ‘If you owe the bank $100, that’s your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that’s the bank’s problem.’ And how they interact with banks, loans, etc. is far different in scale and method than the average consumer anyway.

  • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I’m sure they will be able to weather the storm. I bet they could find a way to get by on “only” a billion, let’s say.