Unprecedented Surge in Larry Ellison's Wealth Threatens Elon Musk's Position as the Richest Person in the World
The wealth of Oracle's American founder, Larry Ellison, witnessed a massive leap on Wednesday, September 10, exceeding $110 billion, driven by a rise in the company's shares of more than 40%, following strong forecasts announced by the company for cloud computing business growth.
This significant rise came just a day after Oracle, the software company co-founded by Ellison in 1977, issued strong forecasts for cloud computing business growth over the next five fiscal years. This upward wave raised Ellison's net worth to about $391 billion, bringing him notably closer to displacing Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, from the throne of the richest person in the world, as Musk's wealth is reported by Forbes to be "just under $436 billion".
Ellison (81 years old) remains active at Oracle as the Chief Technology Officer and Chairman of the Board, which has paid off. He has maintained a different strategy than others, as he "has kept his stake in the company, owning more than 1.1 million shares over a period exceeding 25 years".
In contrast, his protégé Marc Benioff, CEO of the software company Salesforce, "did the opposite, and his current wealth is about $10 billion". Meanwhile, Musk's stake in Tesla has risen thanks to "his large bonuses, and the value of his stake in SpaceX has doubled over the past decade".
Ellison's success has not been limited to the software field; he has significantly broadened his interests. He focused on the healthcare sector through "Oracle's acquisition of Cerner for $28 billion in 2022", enhanced his charitable efforts by launching "the Ellison Institute of Technology at Oxford University in December", and contributed to "the completion of the merger between Paramount Global and Skydance worth $8 billion last month".
The main reason behind this leap lies in the strong financial forecasts revealed by the company. Oracle's CEO, Safra Catz, said during a conference call with analysts on Tuesday: "The company signed four multi-billion dollar contracts with three different clients during the first quarter of fiscal year 2026". Thus, "the total bookings reached $455 billion, four times what it was a year ago".
Catz added that "the company expects Oracle's cloud infrastructure revenue to increase by 77% year-over-year to reach $18 billion in the current fiscal year", with ambitious forecasts that "the figure will reach $144 billion by 2030".
These optimistic forecasts strongly propel Oracle into the elite of cloud computing giants competing fiercely for supremacy in the field of artificial intelligence, a list that also includes Amazon, Microsoft, and Google.
