Tech sector brought billionaires a record increase in wealth

Technology billionaires became the only major group of the world's richest people whose combined wealth grew in 2026. In the first nine months, about 100 tech sector representatives from the list of the world's 500 richest people increased their wealth by a record total of $845 billion.

This is according to data from the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The main reasons for the growth were the artificial intelligence boom and the rise in stock prices of technology companies, primarily American ones.

By the end of September, the combined wealth of technology billionaires reached $4.6 trillion. They account for about 36% of all capital held by Bloomberg ranking participants, even though tech sector representatives make up only about a fifth of the list.

In other sectors, the situation was the opposite. Billionaires who made their main fortunes outside the technology industry have collectively lost about $62 billion since the beginning of the year. At the same time, US citizens accounted for 94% of the net wealth growth of all ranking participants.

The growth was especially concentrated among the richest entrepreneurs. Elon Musk increased his wealth by about $310 billion from January to September — that's about 40% of the total capital growth of index participants. After the merger of SpaceX with his artificial intelligence company xAI and the combined entity's IPO in June, Musk's wealth briefly exceeded $1 trillion.

Founder of Dell Technologies Michael Dell also became significantly richer. His wealth grew by 81% to about $254 billion amid increased sales of data center equipment. Mark Zuckerberg added about $23 billion since the beginning of the year. In September, Meta shares rose 27%, posting their best monthly performance in nearly four years after the launch of its new personal AI assistant Muse.

The tech boom also noticeably changed the top of the global wealth ranking. Since September 10, all top ten places have been held by US citizens — Bloomberg notes that this has not happened since the index launched in 2012. Nine of the world's ten richest people derived most of their fortunes from American technology companies.

However, the growth of billionaire wealth has already begun to slow. In mid-June, the combined wealth of the 500 index participants reached a record $13.4 trillion, but then decreased by about 6% to $12.6 trillion. Bloomberg attributes the decline to worsening market conditions and growing investor doubts about the valuations of some companies that benefited from the artificial intelligence hype.

At the same time, the AI boom is creating new billionaires. This year, the ranking included founders of companies developing AI models, as well as owners of server equipment manufacturers, data center component makers, chipmakers, and other infrastructure needed for artificial intelligence development.

Based on materials from: Bloomberg, Bloomberg Billionaires Index