Jeff Bezos could be the world’s first trillionaire by 2026

NEW YORK: Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of e-commerce giant Amazon, is likely to become the world’s first-ever trillionaire within the next six years.

That’s according to an analysis of yearly growth percentage by Comparisun, which advises small and medium-sized businesses. According to Forbes, Bezos is currently the world’s richest individual, with a current net worth of $142.8 billion which has grown at 34 percent over the past five years.

According to the study, the Amazon boss would become a trillionaire (having a net worth of over $1,000 billion) by 2026. After Bezos, the study showed that the most likely candidates to hit $1 trillion are China’s Evergrande boss Xu Jiayin (by 2027) and Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma (by 2030). 

“Jeff Bezos is still by far the world’s richest person and his net worth has grown by 34% on average over the last five years, which could potentially see him become the world’s first trillionaire as early as 2026, at which point he’ll be aged 62,” Comparisun said.

Comparisun’s methodology is based on analysing the market capitalisation of 25 highest valued companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as well as the net worth of top 25 richest people. The research projection was done on the average percentage of annual growth over the last five years and then applied this rate of growth to future years.

According to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index, Bezos’s net worth has risen from $125 billion on April 12 to $143 billion on May 5. Amazon’s shares increased by about 29 percent in 2020. The company has pledged to spend $4 billion or more to develop COVID-19 testing capabilities for employees, enhanced cleaning of facilities and higher wages for hourly teams.

Amazon declared that it recorded sales of over $75 billion during the quarter till March. The company has benefitted from the coronavirus-led lockdowns across the US and other key markets as people stay at home and rely on online deliveries.

Comparisun said within the next two years, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft could all be in the $1 trillion club. Berkshire Hathaway and Visa could join them by 2023.

The news of the ‘trillionaire’ projection brought some strong reactions on social media as man expressed anger at Bezos’ possible gains from the ongoing coronavirus pandemic as many in the US and across the world have lost their jobs and lives,