U.S. stock markets hit new all-time highs in September, lifting the planet’s ten wealthiest people by a combined $201 billion and pushing their total to about $2.3 trillion as of 12:00 a.m. Eastern on October 1, 2025.
All but three members of this elite group were richer than at the end of August, but the month still left notable losers and dramatic single-day winners amid rapid AI, cloud and chip-driven market moves.
Elon Musk and Larry Ellison accounted for nearly three-quarters of the top-10’s total monthly gains, with Musk adding roughly $75.2 billion and Ellison roughly $70.9 billion during September.
Nvidia cofounder Jensen Huang was the only person to climb the ranks—jumping two spots to No. 7—while Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Warren Buffett saw their fortunes slip month-on-month.
A snapshot of the top 10 (Oct 1, 2025)
Forbes’ list as of October 1 lists Elon Musk at No. 1, followed by Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Jensen Huang, Bernard Arnault, Steve Ballmer and Warren Buffett.
Rankings and net worths are volatile day to day because they are tied tightly to public stock prices and private-valuation moves that Forbes tracks on its Real-Time list.
1) Elon Musk
Elon Musk tops the list with a net worth of about $490.8 billion after adding $75.2 billion in September, driven largely by a 33% surge in Tesla shares and renewed investor enthusiasm for the company’s AI and robotics plans.
Musk owns about 12% of Tesla, is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, chairs X and leads xAI, and his recent $1 billion buy of Tesla stock and the pending, controversial pay package tied to “Mars-shot” performance targets have kept scrutiny and upside baked into his fortune.
Tesla’s board proposed an unprecedented pay package that, if fully realized, could be worth up to $1 trillion before taxes and vesting costs, tied to aggressive growth milestones, which Forbes continues to discount for now.
A Delaware judge once described the award as “the largest potential compensation opportunity ever observed in public markets,” and until appeals play out Forbes applies a conservative haircut to those options in its net-worth math.
Musk’s wealth is also linked to private holdings—SpaceX’s tender-offer valuation rose to roughly $400 billion in August 2025 while xAI has been valued at tens of billions after fresh funding rounds.
Tracing his path from South Africa to Canada and then the University of Pennsylvania, Musk’s career includes founding X.com/PayPal, founding SpaceX in 2002, joining Tesla in 2004 and repeatedly betting the proceeds of those ventures into new industries.
2) Larry Ellison
Larry Ellison sits at No. 2 with roughly $341.8 billion after Oracle stock spiked on a cloud growth outlook, including a remarkable one-day jump that Reuters and market watchers pegged at a 36% surge on September 10.
Oracle projected that revenue from its cloud infrastructure business could grow by 700% to $144 billion over the next four years, a forecast that sent investors scrambling into its shares and made Ellison one of the month’s biggest beneficiaries.
Ellison has been expanding influence beyond databases—he joined the Stargate Project, announced in January, that paired Oracle with OpenAI, SoftBank, MGX and others in a $500 billion pledge to build AI infrastructure in the U.S. over four years.
The Oracle founder also consolidated media influence through the August merger of Paramount with Skydance Media—a deal that leaves Ellison and his son David with significant voting control over the combined entity.
3) Mark Zuckerberg
Mark Zuckerberg ranks third with a net worth near $251.5 billion and a slight decline of about $1.5 billion in September as Meta’s share movements offset other corporate strengths.
Zuckerberg remains deeply tied to Meta through approximately 13% ownership and as CEO he steers the social-media giant’s investments across Instagram, WhatsApp and the metaverse/AI wave that underpins investor expectations.
4) Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos is No. 4 at about $232.5 billion after Amazon shares fell roughly 4% in September, shaving about $8.4 billion from his fortune despite the company’s entrenched e-commerce and cloud franchises.
Bezos, who retains an 8% stake in Amazon after years of sales and philanthropic gifts and who funds Blue Origin, has channeled personal wealth into space, and Blue Origin even flew an all-female crew this year including public figures such as Katy Perry, Gayle King and Lauren Sanchez.
5) Larry Page
Larry Page ranks fifth with around $202.2 billion after a strong month for Alphabet that followed a federal court victory denying a forced Chrome divestiture, which helped push Alphabet shares up 14% in September.
A cofounder of Google, Page remains a controlling shareholder of Alphabet and a board member, and his capital continues to be a linchpin for technology bets ranging from cloud AI to moonshot projects.
6) Sergey Brin
Sergey Brin is No. 6 with about $187.6 billion after adding roughly $21.7 billion during the month, in part due to renewed investor focus on Alphabet’s AI push and Brin’s own return to product work.
Brin, while historically low profile, came out of semi-retirement to influence Google’s AI effort and was listed as a “core contributor” to the Gemini model release, signaling a hands-on approach to the company’s next chapter of AI development.
7) Jensen Huang
Jensen Huang climbed to No. 7 with approximately $162 billion after Nvidia shares rose and the company’s GPUs continued to dominate AI compute, driving Nvidia’s market capitalization to near $4.5 trillion on September 30.
Huang, a cofounder and the long-time CEO of Nvidia, owns around 3% of the company and has overseen Nvidia’s transition from gaming GPUs to the core processors that power generative AI and data-center workloads.
8) Bernard Arnault
Bernard Arnault sits at No. 8 with about $159.4 billion after a modest monthly gain that could not prevent a slip in the rankings as competing tech wealth soared faster.
Arnault built LVMH by assembling marquee luxury brands including Louis Vuitton, Dior, Sephora and Tiffany, and he has positioned family members across the empire while maintaining significant influence over the luxury sector’s global pricing and distribution power.
9) Steve Ballmer
Steve Ballmer is No. 9 with roughly $156 billion after a mild monthly increase driven by Microsoft’s ongoing resilience and Ballmer’s diversified portfolio, including the LA Clippers and other investments.
Since buying the Clippers in 2014, Ballmer has benefited from franchise appreciation—Forbes values the team at several billion dollars—and he remains publicly committed to retaining substantial Microsoft holdings even after decades away from day-to-day management.
10) Warren Buffett
Warren Buffett closes the top 10 with an estimated $150.2 billion as of October 1, 2025, after a slight $200 million decline in the month and an announcement that he will retire as Berkshire Hathaway CEO at the end of 2025.
Buffett, who turned 95 on August 30 and helped launch the philanthropic Giving Pledge in 2010, has given away nearly $65 billion so far and has signaled that the bulk of his remaining wealth will be directed to long-term charitable vehicles.
