Editor’s take: It’s a time of economic uncertainty, rising living costs, and mass job layoffs. People are worried – unless they’re billionaires, of course, the richest of whom have been earning an average of $14 billion per day over the past six months thanks to a broad market rally.

Bloomberg writes that the world’s 500 richest people added $852 billion – or about $14 million each day – to their already vast fortunes across the first half of 2023. It marks the best half-year for billionaires since the second half of 2020 when the economy saw a rebound following the global crash caused by the pandemic.

Central bank interest rate hikes and the ongoing war in Ukraine have been two big factors impacting the economy in recent times. We’ve also seen a number of tech companies that over-hired during Covid times lay off thousands of employees. Despite this, however, the S&P 500, which tracks the stock performance of the 500 largest companies on the stock exchange, is up around 16.5%.

“I got into tech to make a difference”

Tech companies have seen their stocks explode this year thanks to the artificial intelligence revolution. Nvidia’s stock, for example, has risen over 187% in 2023, pushing its market cap above $1 trillion. The result is the Nasdaq 100 increasing 31% – its best-ever first half.

This is all good news for Elon Musk. The world’s richest person has added another $96.6 billion to his net worth this year through June 30, pushing his total wealth to $237 billion – the same GDP as Belgium. Mark Zuckerberg added $58.9 billion during that period, thanks to Meta Platform’s stock rising almost 80%. Jeff Bezos made $47.4 billion, while Larry Ellison generated $40.8 billion.

Not every member of the super wealthy has seen their fortunes increase since January. Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, chairman of Adani Group, lost $60.2 billion, including $20.8 billion in a single day. His losses can be attributed to short-seller Hindenburg Research accusing Adani Group of accounting fraud and stock manipulation, which Adani denies. He’s still worth $51.5 billion, so don’t feel too bad for the guy.