Elon Musk spent\u00a0$44 billion\u00a0to buy Twitter, now known as X, and\u00a0at least $130 million\u00a0to help get\u00a0Donald Trump\u00a0elected president.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a combination that\u2019s paid off handsomely. Since Trump\u2019s victory last week, Musk is about $70 billion richer on paper.<\/p>\n
Most of Musk\u2019s wealth is wrapped up in his holdings of\u00a0Tesla, and in the four trading days since the election, the electric vehicle maker\u2019s stock has soared by about 39%. That\u2019s lifted the company\u2019s market cap well past $1 trillion.<\/p>\n
Musk\u2019s net worth has swelled to $320 billion, according to\u00a0Forbes, putting him close to $90 billion ahead of\u00a0Oracle\u00a0founder\u00a0Larry Ellison, the world\u2019s second-richest person. Ellison, a close friend of Musk\u2019s and a former Tesla board member, is a longtime Republican donor who\u2019s seen his own Trump bump, with Oracle\u2019s 10% increase lifting his net worth by about $20 billion.<\/p>\n
For Musk, getting Trump back into the White House became another full-time job. He\u00a0funded a\u00a0swing-state operation\u00a0to register right-leaning voters, and he led rallies as a surrogate for his favored candidate. He started $1 million giveaways to registered voters who signed one of his America PAC petitions, and he faced\u00a0a lawsuit\u00a0over running an illegal lottery in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
Musk also used X,<\/strong>\u00a0the social media platform he acquired in 2022, to constantly tout his support for Trump while frequently spreading misinformation about his opponent,\u00a0Vice President Kamala Harris, as well as topics like immigration and voter fraud.<\/p>\n Now, Musk is trying to make sure he cashes in on his investments.<\/p>\n After the election last week, Musk briefly joined Trump\u2019s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy,\u00a0NBC News\u00a0reported. Other outlets, including\u00a0The New York Times\u00a0and ABC, have reported that Musk has been weighing in on staffing decisions for the next administration, and he\u2019s spent a lot of time since the election at Trump\u2019s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Brendan Carr, who is likely to be Trump\u2019s choice to run the Federal Communications Commission, is seen as a longstanding Musk ally.<\/p>\n Musk ran a\u00a0straw poll\u00a0on X for his 200-million plus followers asking who should be Senate majority leader, and he\u2019s personally\u00a0endorsed\u00a0Florida Republican Sen.\u00a0Rick Scott\u00a0for the position. He also reposted a comment from Trump about the need for the majority leader to support recess appointments for his nominees so they don\u2019t need Senate confirmation.<\/p>\n \u201cWithout recess appointments, it will take two years or more to confirm the new administration!\u201d\u00a0Musk wrote.<\/p>\n Musk has long sought to reduce regulatory authority so that he can eliminate impediments to his sprawling business empire, which includes Tesla and X, as well as defense contractor SpaceX, artificial intelligence startup xAI, brain computer interface company Neuralink and tunneling venture Boring Co.<\/p>\n Those companies are currently embroiled in a range of probes and lawsuits from federal agencies pertaining to matters including alleged securities law violations, workplace safety, labor and civil rights violations, violations of federal environmental laws, consumer fraud and vehicle safety defects.<\/p>\n Given the executive branch\u2019s outsized control over federal regulatory bodies, Musk can look forward to regulators and intelligence agencies winding down some or all of the 19 known ongoing federal investigations and lawsuits against Tesla, SpaceX and X.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s got the golden touch right now and has the ear,\u201d said Deepwater Asset Management\u2019s Gene Munster, a longtime Tesla bull, in an interview with CNBC on Wednesday.<\/p>\n In addition to Tesla, SpaceX is also a \u201cclear beneficiary\u201d of a Trump presidency, Munster said. He added that xAI could be rewarded as the new administration considers AI regulations.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m stretched to try to find out how this could play out negative for Elon,\u201d Munster said.<\/p>\n Musk didn\u2019t immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n Musk owns 411.06 million Tesla shares, as of the latest filings, and about 304 million performance-based options. In January, Judge Kathaleen McCormick of the Delaware Chancery Court\u00a0voided\u00a0Musk\u2019s historic pay package from 2018 that included the options, calling it \u201cunfathomable\u201d in part because Musk controlled the board. Shareholders then voted in June to retroactively ratify the package. McCormick has said a final ruling on whether to restore Musk\u2019s compensation will\u00a0come soon.Musk and Ellison aren\u2019t the only two billionaire tech executives to see a post-election windfall.<\/p>\n Coinbase\u00a0CEO Brian Armstrong has\u00a0added\u00a0about $4.5 billion to his net worth since Trump\u2019s victory. Coinbase shares soared 20% on Monday, bringing their gains since Tuesday to 67%.<\/p>\n The crypto exchange was a major contributor to pro-crypto candidates up and down the ballot, largely through a PAC called Fairshake. Most of its preferred candidates were victorious, setting the stage for the likelihood of a more\u00a0favorable regulatory environment\u00a0for the industry.<\/p>\n That\u2019s a win for Tesla as well. At the end of the third quarter, the company reported \u201cdigital assets\u201d with a\u00a0fair value\u00a0of $729 million. Cryptocurrencies have rallied since the election, with bitcoin jumping about 29% to a record of over $88,000 on Monday.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Elon Musk spent\u00a0$44 billion\u00a0to buy Twitter, now known as X, and\u00a0at least $130 million\u00a0to help get\u00a0Donald Trump\u00a0elected president. It\u2019s a combination that\u2019s paid off handsomely. Since Trump\u2019s victory last week, Musk is about $70 billion richer on paper. Most of Musk\u2019s wealth is wrapped up in his holdings of\u00a0Tesla, and in the four trading days […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":12186,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}