Elon Musk lost $11bn the day after Donald Trump’s tariffs came into force, according to Bloomberg.
The Tesla CEO and a friend of the US president was among the American billionaires taking the hardest hit as the Trump administration’s new taxes were implemented.
In fact, more than half of those tracked by Bloomberg’s wealth index took a hit to their wealth, with the world’s 500 richest people losing a combined $208bn after Trump’s tariffs announcement.
Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos also suffered major losses.
Here is what the data shows…
Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk at Trump’s inauguration
Elon Musk
On Thursday, the day after the tariffs were announced, Musk lost $11bn, according to Bloomberg.
In total, the Tesla CEO has lost $110bn so far this year.
Shares in Tesla also fell 5.5% on Thursday.
Jeff Bezos
Amazon shares plunged 9% on Thursday, costing the tech giant’s founder $15.9bn in personal wealth.
Mark Zuckerberg
The Meta founder has lost $17.9bn of his wealth since the tariffs were revealed – which is around 9% of his wealth.
Since mid-February, Meta shares have also fallen by about 28%.
Pics: Reuters
Meanwhile, on Thursday, U.S. markets suffered their biggest one-day percentage losses since 2020 after Donald Trump announced widespread global tariffs would be introduced on 9 April.
A tariff is effectively a tax on imported goods – the US has been on the wrong end of these for decades and Trump’s hope is that his policy will encourage companies to manufacture inside the US and thus “make America wealthy again.”
But the scale of Trump’s actions threatens to drive up prices in the US and has already caused chaos in the global economy.
European and Asian markets have suffered notable falls – but the US was worst hit with £2.4trn wiped off the value of its biggest companies.
Household names such as Dell, Apple and Ralph Lauren were among the big fallers.
Despite that, Trump said the markets are “going to boom”.
Governments around the world are broadly adopting two approaches – hitting back with counter tariffs, or waiting to see how this settles.
The UK, which was hit by a relatively low 10% tariff and is hoping to strike an economic deal with the Trump administration, is in the latter camp – but did publish a long list of US products that could be subject to reciprocal tariffs down the line.
@Sky News
