By Abby Schultz
It's perhaps no surprise that stock market volatility is reflected in the ranks of the world's top billionaires so far this year.
Tech billionaires still dominate the Bloomberg Billionaire Index, led by Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Musk's net worth -- at $644 billion by Bloomberg's calculations -- is set to skyrocket further, potentially reaching at least $1 trillion with the initial public offering of SpaceX, the trillion dollar space exploration company he founded and leads. The IPO, filed confidentially on Wednesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, is expected to raise between $40 billion and $80 billion.
Two sons of Walmart founder Sam Walton -- Jim Walton, co-manager of the family office and holding company Walton Enterprises, and Rob Walton, former Walmart chairman, are now among the elite top 10 of the Bloomberg index. The Waltons' wealth tracks a 10.2% gain in Walmart's shares in the first quarter; by contrast, shares in tech companies held by the Walton brothers' billionaire peers are all down for the quarter.
Jim Walton's net worth as of March 31 was $146 billion, ranking him the eighth wealthiest billionaire in the world, while Rob Walton's net worth was $143 billion, ranking him No. 10, Bloomberg said. Both, who each own about 11% of Walmart shares, saw a 7.2% gain in their wealth so far this year, according to Bloomberg. Their sister, Alice Walton, is ranked No. 13, with wealth of $142 billion.
Musk was the only other billionaire among the top 10 whose net worth turned positive through the first quarter, gaining 3.9% to $644 billion, according to Bloomberg. That's no thanks to shares in Tesla, which dropped about 15% from Jan. 2 through March 31.
Calculating an individual's wealth, however, is more art than science. Estimates of Musk's wealth vary, largely depending on how his private companies -- which also include Neuralink and the Boring Co. -- are valued. Bloomberg's calculations, for instance, include potential liabilities Musk may have. Estimates also don't include a pay package Tesla shareholders approved for Musk should Tesla's value climb to about $8.5 trillion.
Barron's , with assistance from Rainmaker Securities, which connects buyers and sellers of securities of private companies, estimates Musk's wealth today at about $800 billion; Forbes says it is $820 billion.
Aside from Musk, and the Waltons, the rankings for others among the top 10 billionaires haven't drastically changed even as their wealth has slipped, by Bloomberg's calculations. Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin are still ranked No. 2 and No. 4, respectively, as they were at year end, although their wealth each dropped 8.1% (Shares of Alphabet, Google's parent, fell about 9% in the quarter). Page's wealth is now $247 billion and Brin's is $230 billion.
Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos' wealth slipped 9.2% in the quarter to $230 billion (Amazon stock was down about 8% for the quarter). Bezos remains the third-richest billionaire.
Meta Platforms founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg skipped above Oracle founder and CEO Larry Ellison to rank No. 5. Zuckerberg's wealth fell 13.1% in the quarter to $203 billion, amid concerns about Meta's AI spending and a recent legal judgment against it. But Ellison's dropped 21.2% to $195 billion as Oracle shares fell nearly 25% in the quarter. Ellison, whose wealth briefly exceeded Musk's this past September, owns about 40% of Oracle shares.
The other tech titan among the top 10 is Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, ranked No. 9, whose wealth slipped 6.5% in the quarter to $144 billion. Nvidia's shares are down about 7.6% for the quarter.
In seventh place was Bernard Arnault, chairman and CEO of French luxury conglomerate LVMH, whose wealth saw the steepest drop of the quarter, falling more than 26% -- in sync with LVMH shares -- to $153 billion. Arnault's wealth, however, includes all shares held by his family, according to Bloomberg.
Leaving the top 10 for the first time in more than a year is Warren Buffett. Buffett, the former CEO and current chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, landed at No. 11, as his wealth fell 8.4% to $143 billion. Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares have fallen about 3.5% this year to $718,140 on March 31; Buffett holds nearly 38% of the Class A shares, according to Bloomberg. It's more than 99% of his net worth.
Although not among the top 10, or even among the top 450 billionaires tracked daily by Bloomberg, President Donald Trump is a billionaire, and his wealth has jumped 20% in the past year, according to Forbes, which published its annual list of the world's billionaires on March 10. Trump's wealth has grown by $1.4 billion in the past year to $6.5 billion today, according to Forbes.
Crypto is one factor in the president's growing wealth. According to Forbes, World Liberty Financial -- a crypto company launched by Trump and his family in September 2024 -- sold about $550 million of crypto tokens in the past year.
Write to Abby Schultz at abby.schultz@barrons.com
This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 01, 2026 15:48 ET (19:48 GMT)
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