Billionaires’ fortunes plummet: Elon Musk loses $90 billion amid market turmoil, here’s what Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg lost

The year 2025 began on a high note for billionaires, with their combined wealth increasing by an astonishing $10 billion per day in January.

However, just a month later, the financial euphoria has turned into a brutal downturn, with some of the world’s richest individuals experiencing staggering losses.

Notably, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison, and Mark Zuckerberg have collectively lost $138 billion in a matter of weeks, as mentioned in a report by Fortune.


Musk alone has seen his net worth decline by $90 billion, reflecting the broader market turbulence that has unsettled investors and corporate giants alike.

Billionaires Watch Their Fortunes Disappear

January was a period of immense financial growth for the world’s wealthiest individuals, with their collective net worth swelling by $314 billion—a figure roughly equivalent to the annual salary of 15 million workers.

However, by February, this upward trajectory had reversed dramatically.

• Elon Musk’s net worth dropped from $433 billion to $349 billion, marking a significant decline.
• Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, saw his fortune shrink from $243 billion to $232 billion.
• Larry Ellison, chairman of Oracle, recorded a personal loss of $9 billion.

The downturn has been particularly severe for technology billionaires, whose fortunes are closely tied to stock market performance and emerging industry trends.

DeepSeek’s Rise Sparks Market Chaos

A major factor behind the rapid loss of wealth is the unexpected success of DeepSeek, a Chinese artificial intelligence company that has disrupted the tech industry, as per theFortune magazine’s report.

• DeepSeek’s R1 model, a low-cost AI innovation, has sent shockwaves through the market, particularly impacting major players like Meta and Nvidia.
• As a result, Nvidia’s market value plunged by $600 billion, marking one of the biggest drops in U.S. stock market history.
• Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO, saw his personal fortune decline by $20 billion, falling to $103 billion.

DeepSeek’s rapid ascent has triggered a massive selloff in AI-related stocks, leading to a domino effect across Silicon Valley’s wealthiest executives.

Tech Moguls Bear the Brunt of the Selloff

The impact of DeepSeek’s market disruption has not been limited to just a few individuals. Many of the biggest names in the tech industry have suffered heavy losses:

• Larry Ellison lost $27.6 billion, causing him to slip from the third-richest to the fifth-richest person in the world.
• Michael Dell, founder of Dell Technologies, saw his fortune shrink by $12.4 billion.
• Elon Musk lost $5.3 billion in the selloff, adding to his already steep decline.
• Google co-founder Larry Page suffered a $6.3 billion loss, while Google investor Andreas von Bechtolsheim saw $5.4 billion wiped from his net worth.

With DeepSeek’s continued expansion and the AI industry undergoing rapid shifts, financial analysts predict that more volatility could be ahead for billionaires who have built their empires on technology stocks.

FAQs:

Does DeepSeek have a daily limit?

Perplexity AI has announced an increase in the daily query limit for DeepSeek R1 on its platform, raising the cap to 500.

Is DeepSeek better than ChatGPT?

DeepSeek may be preferable to ChatGPT for tasks requiring technical precision, such as coding and information retrieval. However, ChatGPT generally outperforms in creative writing and general conversation.