Larry Ellison Overtakes Elon Musk as World’s Richest After Oracle Stock Surge

Larry Ellison reclaimed the title of the world’s richest person early Wednesday as shares of his software company, Oracle, vaulted more than a third in a matter of minutes after the company reported blockbuster earnings driven by large customer orders tied to artificial intelligence initiatives, according to the Bloomberg wealth tracker.

Bloomberg put the 81-year-old Oracle co-founder’s net worth at about $393 billion, several billion more than Elon Musk, who had held the top ranking for the past four years. Bloomberg’s estimate for Musk was about $385 billion. Forbes, which uses a different methodology and assigns a higher value to Musk’s private holdings such as SpaceX, continued to list Musk as the richest person with a net worth near $439 billion.

Oracle’s rapid market move followed an earnings report investors interpreted as evidence that large enterprises are accelerating spending on AI-enabled software and infrastructure. The company said it received multibillion-dollar orders from customers as demand for technologies that support large-scale AI computing intensified. The stock’s sharp intraday advance reflected the market’s swift reassessment of Oracle’s revenue prospects amid the broader AI investment cycle.

Market swings at the top of rich-person rankings often reflect volatile public equity moves and differing approaches to valuing private companies. Tesla, one of Musk’s largest publicly traded assets, has declined about 14% so far this year through Tuesday, a shift that has weighed on his publicly tracked net worth. Discrepancies between Bloomberg and Forbes estimates largely stem from methods used to value private stakes such as SpaceX and other non-public assets.

Ellison, who co-founded Oracle in 1977 and left college early, has long been a prominent figure in enterprise software and cloud infrastructure. His return to the top spot underscores how sudden stock market reactions to corporate earnings and secular technology trends—particularly around AI—can reshape wealth rankings.

Wealth-tracking lists are updated continuously and can change with intraday stock moves, company disclosures and reassessments of private-asset valuations. For now, Bloomberg’s tracker shows Ellison leading the standings, while Forbes maintains Musk at the top based on its own valuation methodology.