To The Moon

Driven by the AI frenzy, the combined net worth of America's top ten technology billionaires has surged by over $550 billion in 2025. Tesla CEO Elon Musk continues to hold the lead, while NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang has significantly climbed the ranks, propelled by an artificial intelligence-driven wealth explosion. Data shows that as of the US market close on December 24th, the founders and CEOs of the top ten US tech companies possess over $2.5 trillion in cash, stocks, and other investments. This figure is higher than the $1.9 trillion at the start of the year, during which the S&P 500 index rose more than 18%. Silicon Valley's leading companies have profited from the global investment of trillions of dollars into AI chips, data centers, and products, although their gains have somewhat diminished in recent months due to concerns about an AI-driven investment bubble. "This is all speculative and tied to the success of AI," said Jason Furman, a Harvard economics professor and advisor to startup OpenAI, "Whether this ultimately pays off remains a huge question mark, but investors are betting it will succeed." Elon Musk remains firmly atop the list of tech billionaires, with his net worth growing nearly 50% this year to reach $645 billion. Musk only briefly lost the top spot in September this year, when Oracle founder Larry Ellison surpassed him. Musk's wealth has skyrocketed over the past year, as he secured a $1 trillion compensation agreement with Tesla shareholders, and the valuation of his rocket company SpaceX soared to $800 billion. Another winner of the AI boom is NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang, who ranks eighth on the US tech billionaire list with a net worth of $156 billion. Regulatory filings show that Huang sold over $1 billion worth of stock this year, benefiting handsomely from NVIDIA's rise to become the world's leading AI chip manufacturer. Amazon's Jeff Bezos also sold $5.6 billion worth of stock this year, while Michael Dell sold over $2 billion worth of stock in his namesake technology company. Due to investor concerns over Meta's massive spending on AI infrastructure and compensation agreements with top AI researchers, the company's stock recently plummeted, causing its founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg to slip in the billionaire rankings. Three months ago, Oracle announced a $300 billion data center cooperation agreement with OpenAI, causing Ellison's net worth to surge. However, market worries about how Oracle will finance its data center construction have led its stock price to fall 40% from its September high. As Google has made significant strides in developing its own AI models and chips, the net worth of its co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin increased by $270 billion and $255 billion respectively, surpassing both Zuckerberg and Ellison. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is the only billionaire on the list whose net worth at year-end is lower than at the start of the year, as he continues to sell his shares in the software giant to fund his philanthropic endeavors.