It’s never a bad time to be a billionaire, but this is an especially good time to have a 10-figure bank statement.

The 10 richest people in the world added US$402bil to their already enormous fortunes in 2021. The biggest gainer was Elon Musk, who started the year with a net worth of US$156bil and will end it with around US$277bil , according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The Tesla founder said he’s planning to pay more than US$11bil in taxes.

Musk’s US$121bil gain was smaller than the US$140bil he made in 2020, but was more than enough to make him the richest person alive by a long shot.

He has been spending part of that fortune on his rocket hobby. SpaceX, the private rocket company he founded in 2002, has already launched more than 1,600 satellites, including a recent launch on Dec 18.

His closest competitor and fellow rocket-building billionaire, Jeff Bezos, will enter 2022 worth US$190bil . That’s a mere US$4.5bil gain since this time last year.

The 57-year-old, who stepped down from his CEO role at Amazon in July, now spends most of his free time vacationing with girlfriend Lauren Sánchez. The PDA-heavy couple (Public Display of Affection) was spotted on a yacht in St. Barts over Christmas.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg added nearly US$25bil to his fortune in 2020. He’s worth US$128bil , according to Bloomberg. Zuckerberg, who changed the name of Facebook’s holding company to Meta this year, has had a turbulent year, which saw whistleblower Frances Haugen accusing him of putting “profits before people”, and him later raising the ire of Hawaiians after he added 110 acres to his controversial 1,500-acre estate in Kauai.

Microsoft founder Bill Gates began the new year worth US$139bil . He entered 2021 with a value of US$132bil . His former wife, Melinda French Gates - who ended her 27-year marriage to Bill in August - reportedly has a net worth of US$11.4bil .

Google co-founder Larry Page cracked the 12-digit club in 2021 by adding US$47bil to the US$83bil he had coming into this year. Fellow Google co-founder Sergey Brin also enjoyed that distinction by becoming worth US$125bil , thanks to a 2021 gain of US$45bil .

While it was a good year for US businessmen, French luxury goods peddler Bernard Arnault also saw his fortune leap to US$176bil after hauling in more than US$61bil . He’s the only billionaire outside the US to have cracked Bloomberg’s 2021 top 10 list in terms of total wealth.

All 10 of those power players are worth more than US$100bil . The 11th-wealthiest person on the list, also from France, is Francoise Bettencourt Meyers, who’s valued at nearly US$94bil . The heiress is the richest woman alive.

 - TNS