Louis Vuitton Chairman Briefly Becomes Richest Amid Pandemic Boom

Photo by Forbes

[Asia Economy Reporter Yujin Cho] Bernard Arnault, chairman of LVMH (Louis Vuitton Mo?t Hennessy), briefly surpassed Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, to become the world's richest person, Forbes reported on the 24th (local time).

On that morning, as LVMH's stock price rose early in the trading session, Arnault's fortune increased to $186.3 billion. As a result, he narrowly overtook Bezos and briefly claimed the top spot as the world's richest person. However, later that afternoon, Amazon's stock price gained further, and Bezos regained the number one position.

Arnault's fortune, which was valued at $76 billion in March last year, has surged by more than $110 billion over the past 14 months, fueled by the rise in LVMH's stock price benefiting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Flavio Cereda, an analyst at global investment bank Jefferies, explained, "Driven by luxury shopping momentum from China, LVMH's sales in the first quarter of this year increased by 32% compared to the same period last year."

As of that afternoon, the global richest rankings were led by Bezos and Arnault, followed by Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla ($152.5 billion), Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft (MS) ($126 billion), Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook ($117.7 billion), and Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway ($109.4 billion).

For the past 20 years, the title of the world's richest person has been dominated by Americans such as Bezos, Bill Gates, and Elon Musk. Arnault is the only European to have reached the number one spot.

Arnault also briefly overtook Bezos to become the world's richest person during trading on December 16, 2019, but at that time, Amazon's stock price rose again, and he soon relinquished the top position.

Forbes reported that the global richest rankings have undergone significant changes due to the impact of COVID-19. Elon Musk's net worth surged to $189.7 billion in January, driven by Tesla's stock price increase, making him the world's richest person until March.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.