(Bloomberg) -- While Elon Musk tinkers with newly acquired Twitter, his net worth has dropped by almost half from last year’s peak.
Shares of Tesla Inc., the electric car maker that comprises the bulk of his fortune, traded as low as $186.75 intraday Tuesday as investors question whether the billionaire is spreading himself too thin among his many high-profile ventures. Tesla is down 45% this year, compared with the 19% drop of the S&P 500 Index and the 32% decline of the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index.
Musk has shaved about $92 billion off his fortune this year — the most of anyone tracked by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index — and is now worth $177 billion. Though still the world’s richest person, his wealth reached a peak of $340 billion just a year ago as Tesla’s share price hit a record of $410.
Musk, 51, the chief executive officer of Tesla, completed his takeover of Twitter on Oct. 27 and wasted little time in shaking things up, firing about half of the San Francisco-based firm’s employees only to rehire some of them. Companies including General Motors Co. and Volkswagen AG have said they’re pausing paid advertising on the site until they can better assess how the platform will change under Musk’s ownership.
Tesla, meanwhile, is struggling with economic pressures in its most important market outside the US, shutting its flagship Beijing showroom recently and lowering prices across the board in China. The company last month reported third-quarter sales that missed analysts’ estimates, with Musk acknowledging the slowdown in China and the effect of rising interest rates.
“Demand is a little harder than it otherwise would be,” he said in a call with analysts. He also said Tesla is “not reducing our production in any meaningful way, recession or not recession.”
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