Warren Buffett's philosophy has been a benchmark for investors for decades. But the Corona crisis and the current hype about technology stocks are throwing old certainties over the pile. Now Buffett is overtaken by someone whose company makes little profit and who finds the distribution of capital "boring".
Tesla boss Elon Musk jumped several places in the ranking of the richest people in the world and has overtaken the legendary investor Warren Buffett. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Musk is now the seventh richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of $ 70.5 billion. On Friday alone, the entrepreneur's wealth grew another $ 6.1 billion as a result of an 11 percent rise in Tesla shares.
Musk owns a good 20 percent of Tesla's stake, and he holds a majority stake in the unlisted space company SpaceX, which, according to Bloomberg, is worth around 15 billion. Musk's fortune grew not only because the value of his Tesla shares has more than tripled since the beginning of the year alone. According to his extraordinary employment contract, the price increases also earned him extreme bonuses – most recently $ 595 million.
Buffett's fortune, on the other hand, has shrunk from just over $ 90 billion to more recently $ 69.2 billion since the Corona crisis. This was also due to the fact that he transferred 89-year-old shares worth a whopping $ 3 billion to charitable foundations last week. Buffett has donated a total of around $ 37 billion within 14 years.
Above all, however, the opposite development of the two huge assets shows the opposite investment understanding of the "value" investor Buffett and the technology company Musk. The portfolio of classic "old economy" companies such as food manufacturers, insurers and energy companies from Buffetts Holding Bekshire Hathaway has by no means recovered from the Corona crisis. Young technology companies such as Tesla, on the other hand, are experiencing stock market hype. Their stocks are climbing one record high after another as many investors see them as winners of a change accelerated by the crisis.
The personalities of Buffett and Musk also stand for this difference. In an interview a few weeks ago, the Tesla boss described himself as "not the biggest fan" of the old investment guru. Buffett's job is to find out "whether Coke or Pepsi made more capital. I mean, it's a pretty boring job if you ask me."
Buffett had once replied to a question about Musk last year that he saw the 49-year-old "room for improvement" in his behavior as a company boss, by which he meant above all the controversial tweets that had already caused him trouble with the stock exchange regulator.
. (tagsToTranslate) Economy (t) Tech visionary (t) Value investor (t) Musk (t) Buffett (t) List of realms