Jeff Bezos, other tech moguls lost billions in stock market plunge

Tech billionaires lost billions of dollars as the stock market slumped Wednesday and stock prices tumbled.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who has recently become the richest person in the world, lost $9.1 billion, according to Forbes. (He’s still the richest person in the world, though, with $144.7 billion.)

Bill Gates lost $1.8 billion, Mark Zuckerberg lost $2.4 billion, Larry Page of Google lost $2.2 billion and China’s Ma Huateng lost $2.8 billion.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell more than 800 points Wednesday — its worst day in eight months. The selloff was sparked by the worst day for tech companies in seven years, CNBC reports. The S&P 500 closed 3.3 per cent lower and the Nasdaq fell by four per cent.

As for individual stocks, Amazon fell 6.15 per cent, which amounted to a loss of $56 billion in market capitalization, Business Insider reported.

Netflix lost about $13 billion when its shares dropped eight per cent.

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Facebook shares fell about four per cent, Google shares dropped 4.6 per cent. Apple lost about $51 billion when shares also dropped 4.6 per cent.

Collectively, the five tech firms lost $172 billion in just a few hours.

The tech sector has slid 5.5 per cent so far this month, already its worst since August 2015.

“It is a perfect storm for technology right now with the tariff war with China and weaker demand for chips,” Ryan Nauman, market strategist at Informa Financial Intelligence, told Reuters.

European stocks fell to a 21-month low, following Wall Street’s slump.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asian shares not including Japan ended down 3.6 per cent, having struck its lowest level since March 2017. China’s main indexes had slumped over 5 per cent.

The stock slump attracted the attention of U.S. President Donald Trump, who pointed an accusing finger at the Fed for raising interest rates.

“I really disagree with what the Fed is doing,” Trump told reporters before a political rally in Pennsylvania. “I think the Fed has gone crazy.”