Elon Musk made $1.1 billion on paper yesterday, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires index, as shares of Tesla Motors (TSLA) gained nearly 14 percent. The haul brings his net worth to $11.7 billion, up 47.8 percent since the start of the year.
This chart shows the vertiginous climb in Musk’s net worth since spring—and especially since the end of 2013:
The right edge of the chart resembles the neck of a noshing Apatosaurus. Musk’s fortune closely tracks with Tesla stock, also displayed above—he’s the largest shareholder, owning 23 percent of the company. Musk also owns a quarter of SolarCity, an energy company that has also shot up this year, and a $2.1 billion stake in Space Exploration Technologies, aka SpaceX.
As big as Musk’s 2014 has been, two billionaires have outpaced him this year. With a gain of $7.8 billion, Jack Ma, founder of China’s Alibaba Group, has leapt into the world’s top 100 richest people ahead of an expected initial public offering. And Mark Zuckerberg has ridden a 27 percent surge in Facebook (FB) shares to pad his $31.2 billion fortune by $6.5 billion.
Musk and Zuckerberg are bucking the trend for U.S. billionaires, the richest of whom have lost money this year, with stock indexes trading almost flat since Jan. 1. Amazon (AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos is the U.S. billionaire faring worst in 2014, down $3.4 billion.
