Mark Zuckerberg drops below top 5 richest people, loses $5 billion wealth as Meta stock slides 2.3% — here’s why
Tech mogul Mark Zuckerberg lost $5 billion of his fortune tied to Meta shares on Nov. 6 after shares fell 2.3 percent on reports that internal forecasts predicted the company would derive a “portion” of its revenue from running fraudulent ads, Forbes reported.
As a result, Mark Zuckerberg, who for the year was the third richest person in the world after Tesla chief Elon Musk and Oracle’s Larry Ellison, lost $5 billion of his net worth due to the stock crash on November 6.
Notably, Mark Zuckerberg holds approximately 13 percent of Meta shares. He is now among the 5 richest people in the world.
How far has Mark Zuckerberg fallen in the billionaire rankings?
Before Meta’s shares moved, 41-year-old Mark Zuckerberg was the third richest person in the world. After today’s drop, he now ranks behind Elon Musk ($496.5 billion), Larry Ellison ($298.8 billion), Amazon founder Jeff Bezos ($257 billion), and Google co-founders Larry Page ($235 billion) and Sergey Brin ($217.9 billion).
Forbes Real-time billionaires list ranked the Meta Platforms co-founder at sixth place with a net worth of $212.5 billion, down $5.6 billion or 2.57 percent at 10:46 pm IST on November 6, at the time of writing.
Meta stock fell 2.3% — Why?
According to the Forbes report, Meta shares fell 2.3 percent to around $620.75 on the morning of November 6. This contributes to a nearly 17.5 percent decline in share value over the past week, including when the company reported third-quarter earnings. On the third quarter earnings day, it was stated that the single-day decline was over 11 percent.
The stock drop on Nov. 6 came after Reuters reported that Meta’s internal documents predicted 10 percent of its advertising revenue would come from scam and banned product ads. The report estimates that the company’s 10 percent revenue is around $16 billion.
The agency’s report “presents a selective view that distorts Meta’s approach to fraud and fraud,” Meta spokesman Andy Stone told Reuters, adding that the company’s internal estimates were lower and that the 10 percent estimate included “a lot” of legitimate advertising.
He did not provide any updated figures to Reuters and did not respond to questions from Forbes, the report said.
The Reuters report added that other documents also show that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (US SEC) is examining Meta for running financial scam ads. According to a Forbes report, citing UK regulatory authorities, Meta’s products were involved in 54 percent of payment-related fraud losses in 2023; That’s more than twice as much as all other social media sites combined.
(With input from institutions)
