© 2025 Getty Images / Getty Images News via Getty Images Elon Musk’s net worth declined in the early part of 2026 due to Tesla’s (NASDAQ: TSLA | TSLA Price Prediction) problems. Tesla’s stock dropped from $480 in mid-December to $355 recently. Its market cap today is $1.35 trillion. Musk owns about 15% of the company. His net worth received a significant boost as SpaceX announced an IPO that could value the company at $1.5 trillion (although the final price of the stock has not been announced). Musk owns about 45% of SpaceX. xAI, Musk’s xAI company has been merged into SpaceX, as the companies announced in February. At the time, xAI was valued at $250 billion. SpaceX was valued at $1 trillion. According to the Bloomberg Billionaire list, Musk’s net worth is up $16 billion to $636 billion this year. Among the 15 richest people in the world, none can match the increase. Musk not only ranks No.1 on the list. No.2, Larry Page of Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOG), is worth $254 billion. Most of the other richest people on the list have posted declines in net worth this year as megatech companies become less attractive to investors. This is primarily because they are betting huge amounts on AI. The market believes not all of them can be winners. Musk owns stakes in several other companies, but none of them is valued anywhere near Tesla or SpaceX. These include Neuralink, the implantable brain-machine interface operations, and The Boring Company, which develops intra-city transit systems. Musk has a long-term options deal that, over 10 years, could make his Tesla stock worth over $1 trillion. In many ways, Musk’s wealth came out of nowhere compared to most other people on the tech list. Tech billionaires like Bill Gates had been on the list for over a decade. So has Warren Buffett. Some, such as the Walton family have been on for decades. Each began to gather extreme wealth before the turn of the century. SpaceX owns the space rocket business. Its value is unlikely to decline and could increase considerably. Musk may stay at the top of the rich list indefinitely About the Author