Mark Zuckerberg, billionaire founder of social media platform Meta (formerly known as Facebook), lost $29 billion in net worth on Thursday after the company’s stock witnessed a record single-day plunge of 26 per cent, which erased over $200 billion.
Zuckerberg is now at the 13th spot in the Forbes global list of real time billionaires with a net worth of $82.5 billion, and ranks below Indian billionaires Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani.
Gautam Adani and Family is at the 10th spot in the list with a net worth of $91.1 billion, while Ambani, with $89.2 billion, at the 11th spot.
Meta Platforms Inc’s stocks crashed after the company reported weak earnings forecast, according to a report by Reuters. It is the biggest ever one-day market value wipeout for a US company. Zuckerberg owns close to 12.8 per cent of Meta.
Meta has reportedly blamed Apple Inc’s privacy changes and increased competitions from rivals like TikTok and YouTube for its weaker-than-expected forecast, a day earlier on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Zuckerberg’s single-day wealth decline is also among the biggest, after Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s similar loss of $35 billion in a single day, in November last year. Zuckerberg has also reportedly asked his employees to focus on developing the company’s short video products after the rout, Bloomberg reported.
Zuckerberg had reportedly sold Meta shares worth $4.47 billion last year, before the tech rout. The stock sales were carried out as part of a pre-set 10b5-1 trading plan, which executives use to allay concerns about insider trading, according to the Reuters report.
Musk continues to top the list of global billionaires with a net worth of $234.7 billion, according to data from Forbes. French billionaire Bernard Arnault with $194.7 billion and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos with $181.1 billion hold the second and third positions, respectively.
(With agency inputs)
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