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Elon Musk, who is evidently the strangest and most embarrassing rich man we just happen to have, is getting close to becoming a trillionaire; a concept far scarier than everything he already is.
Forbes claims that the Tesla CEO’s net worth has hit $845 billion, making him the first person to ever cross $800 billion. That’s more than Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Mark Zuckerberg (2nd, 3rd, and 4th richest people) combined.
Tesla is Elon’s most recognizable work, as much as he hates it. But to get to his goal of being worth more than literal advanced economies, this guy isn’t relying on the so-called “automaker,” he is relying on SpaceX.
Now already, nearly two-thirds of Elon’s wealth now comes from SpaceX. That number exploded after SpaceX took over his other company, xAI, the one that builds AI and owns the social media platform X (formerly Twitter).
The deal gave the combined company a value of $1.25 trillion, based on financial records. Elon owns about 43% of it. That means his stake is now worth more than $530 billion.
SpaceX takeover of xAI changes where his money comes from
The xAI merger of course pushed Elon even closer to trillionaire status. SpaceX already launches satellites, builds rockets, works with the U.S. government, and runs its own defense projects. xAI brings in a powerful AI model and full control of a platform that runs on political drama and user engagement.
SpaceX has already brought in more than $20 billion from U.S. government contracts, based on research from FedScout. Elon said the new merger is part of building orbital data centers, which would use satellites to run AI systems above Earth instead of inside data warehouses.
Elon’s changing focus hasn’t gone unnoticed. In Tesla’s latest proxy filing, the company stated that “a majority of Mr. Musk’s wealth is now derived from other business ventures.”
And boy, that is not good at all.
Elon plans to take SpaceX public sometime in 2026. If he does, it could give him access to more cash and increase his ranking again. But the business itself is a mix of military contracts, satellites, and a high-cost AI model trying to go against Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic. Public investors might not want to buy into that.
Tesla pay package and political power tighten the focus
Elon still has a reason to care about Tesla. Last year, Cryptopolitan reported that Tesla shareholders approved a pay package that could be worth $1 trillion. But it’s not guaranteed. The deal is split into 12 tranches, and he only gets paid if Tesla hits a set of milestones.
The first goal is for Tesla to reach a $2 trillion valuation, which is about $460 billion more than where it sits right now.
Tesla’s board made the deal to keep Elon focused. They said it was designed to “prevent him from prioritizing those other ventures.”
But Elon’s influence doesn’t stop at rockets and cars. His money is reaching into politics too. A report from Oxfam said that at least five people could become trillionaires in the next ten years. In 2024, billionaire wealth grew by $2 trillion, while poverty rates stayed almost exactly the same as they were in 1990.
Oxfam’s director Amitabh Behar said, “The crown jewel of this oligarchy is a billionaire president, backed and bought by the world’s richest man Elon Musk, running the world’s largest economy. We present this report as a stark wake-up call that ordinary people the world over are being crushed by the enormous wealth of a tiny few.”
Elon uses his control of X to affect politics. In India, he let the government hide clips from a BBC documentary that criticized Narendra Modi. In Turkey, his platform suspended opposition accounts right before the 2023 elections.
The more wealth Elon gets, the more political power he will come to hold. He has made that clear enough, using no less than five thousand tweets.
Oxfam says governments need to step in, tax billionaires, and stop one person from holding this much influence.
English (US)