The fear of a recession in the USA led to historical losses on the US exchanges in the night of Friday. The market width stock index S&P 500 lost $ 2.4 trillion in value. The stock crash hit the 500 richest people in the world: their assets dropped $ 208 billion (190 billion euros) in one day. It is the highest loss since the climax of Coronapandemie.
The short fall triggered by new US tariffs hit the hardest loudly Bloomberg assets index
Of all things, those who were still in the front row at Trump’s inauguration in January: the billionaires from the technology industry. Above all meta boss Mark Zuckerberg (40) and Jeff Bezos (61), founder and ex-CEO of the online giant Amazon.
Around 9 percent lost the meta share until the end of the trade in New York and let Zuckerberg’s assets, which are largely based on its ownership, melt by $ 17.9 billion or almost a tenth. Bezos, in turn, lost almost $ 16 billion on paper. Amazon shares had also lost around 9 percent on Thursday, since their high in February the price losses even add up to around a quarter, reports Bloomberg
.
There are numerous other sizes of the international techelite among the largest losers. Including the GoogleFounder Sergey Brin (51) and Larry Page (52), Microsoft’s long-term CEO Steve Ballmer (69) or Oracle founder Larry Ellison (80). Also Trump’s close consultants and Tesla-Thef Elon Musk (53), whose private assets had suffered in the past few weeks after the dramatic decline in value of the Tesla share, lost another $ 11 billion on paper. Small consolation for Musk: According to Bloomberg, he remains the world’s wealthiest person with $ 322 billion.
The shares of technology groups had increased massively in recent years – most recently driven by the AI boom
. Accordingly, the assets of the Silicon-Valley billionaires have increased with the courses, which has now been affected considerably in the stock market crash.
But other super rich like too Bernard Arnault (76), owner of the luxury goods group LVMH, are among the top losers. Arnault’s assets shrank by more than $ 6 billion on Thursday. The group based in France with brands such as Christian Dior and Bulgari, like many other companies, will suffer from a flat rate of 20 percent that the US government has imposed on all products from Europe.
Nevertheless, Trump’s “Zoll-hammer” should also hit the technology industry hard in the United States, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives is convinced. After all, many components for electronic articles in countries of Asia are manufactured, which Trump has occupied with very high, additional tariffs – especially China with 34 percent and Taiwan with 25 percent. In view of the tariffs, the industry threatens an “economic armaged donus”, according to the expert, who otherwise has a positive view of the industry.
US tech corporations threaten further loads
Was the electronics, which include smartphones and PCs, last year with a value of almost $ 486 billion the second largest US import post.
US technology groups also have to fear the EU’s tariffs and-which is probably much sharper-a tax on digital services. Corporations such as Google, Netlfix, Amazon or the Social Media platform X would be particularly affected. For these companies the European Union An important market with more than 450 million inhabitants.
If Trump’s trade war started, the stock assets of the technology billionaires could quickly shrink. It will be shown whether they are still so solidarity too solidarity or try to reins the US President. Quite a few observers in Europe hope for the latter.