Bill Gates Could Have Been 'World's First Trillionaire' By Ignoring Buffett's Advice — Instead, He Lost $10 Billion Shorting Tesla, Says Elon Musk
Billionaire entrepreneur and Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO, Elon Musk, once again reignited the debate surrounding Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT) co-founder, Bill Gates‘ massive wealth, and what it could have been, had he not conformed to conventional wealth planning norms.
Bill Gates Could Have Been ‘World’s First Trillionaire’
On Wednesday, in a post on X, investor Michael Arouet highlighted the current top 10 richest people in the world, a list that no longer includes the Microsoft co-founder but does feature former CEO Steve Ballmer at No. 8, with an estimated net worth of $166 billion.
This comes after being ranked as the world’s wealthiest person by Forbes magazine for 18 of the 24 years between 1995 and 2017.
Arouet shared the story of Gates’ decision to sell his position in Microsoft on the advice of legendary investor and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK) (NYSE:BRK) CEO, Warren Buffett, who asked him to diversify his holdings.
According to Arouet, if Gates hadn’t listened to Buffett, he would now be “the world's first trillionaire, worth twice as much as Elon.”
As Microsoft shares continue to soar, and its market capitalization is now at $3.6 trillion, Gates’ net worth would have stood at a staggering $1.5 trillion if he had retained all of his shares in the company and hadn’t embarked on the massive philanthropic journey with his ex-wife, Melinda Gates.
To be fair, it's difficult to fault Buffett for that advice. Few could have anticipated Microsoft's extraordinary surge over the past decade, particularly after the stock spent years largely treading water following the dot-com crash, taking roughly 15 years to reclaim its prior peak.
Lost $10 Billion In Tesla Short Position
Musk weighed in on the post, once again bringing attention to the short position that he claimed Gates has held against Tesla for the past eight years.
In his reply to the post, Musk said “Bill Gates placed a massive short bet against Tesla,” which he said was 1% of the company’s total shares outstanding, while adding that the position has since cost the Microsoft co-founder as much as $10 billion, as Tesla shares soared over the past few years.
Shares of Tesla were down 4.62% on Wednesday, closing at $467.26, while Microsoft was down 0.05%, at $476.12. Tesla scores high on Momentum and Growth in Benzinga’s Edge Stock Rankings, with a favorable price trend in the short, medium and long terms. Click here to see how it compares with Microsoft.
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Photo courtesy: Alexandros Michailidis on Shutterstock