Musk's trillioniare status means he's wealthier than his next three contemporaries combined - and also worth more than historical tycoons like John D. Rockefeller

A rally in SpaceX and Tesla shares sent Elon Musk's net worth back above the trillion-dollar mark.

Recent gains in shares of SpaceX and Tesla have pushed Elon Musk's net worth back beyond the trillion-dollar mark.

Musk's wealth has earned him the title of the world's first and only trillionaire - and the richest person in the history of America by certain measures, surpassing the wealth of industrialists like John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie when looking relative to economic output.

As of Thursday, Musk's net worth was $1.02 trillion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The majority of Musk's wealth comes from his stakes in SpaceX (SPCX) and Tesla (TSLA), two companies with multi-trillion-dollar market capitalizations. Since the beginning of the month, shares of both companies have risen 6%.

Musk holds a 48.4% equity stake in SpaceX, which represents approximately 6.42 billion shares across common stock, options and unvested performance awards, according to an August SEC filing. Musk also owns 20% of Tesla, according to a June SEC filing. However, wealth calculations typically exclude the value of unvested performance shares. Musk also owns shares of his private companies Neuralink and the Boring Co.

These positions make Musk's net worth highly volatile. His wealth peaked at $1.32 trillion in June following SpaceX's IPO but then fell below $700 billion in August as those shares lost ground.

Despite these fluctuations, Musk has solidly established himself as the wealthiest person in the world, both now and compared to previous eras.

Musk's current net worth makes him richer than the world's next three wealthiest individuals - Google (GOOG) (GOOGL) co-founder Larry Page, Amazon.com (AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos and and Google co-founder Sergey Brin - combined.

Musk has spent the majority of the past five years in the top position since first overtaking Bezos in 2021. Musk's current trillionaire status is also a testament to how much the ceiling for wealth has expanded in the past few years. In 2020, Bezos became the first person to ever cross the $200 billion mark. In April 2025, Musk's net worth of $342 billion made him the wealthiest person in the world. In the 18 months since, Musk's net worth has nearly tripled.

Musk also remains peerless when compared to the richest Americans in history.

The industrialists of the 19th and 20th centuries made their fortunes on new markets like oil, steel and railroads. Today, the artificial-intelligence boom has drawn comparisons to the Industrial Revolution in terms of the transformative potential of the technology. While the economic impact of AI has yet to fully emerge, Musk has already surpassed the richest Americans in history in terms of his relative share of gross domestic output.

MarketWatch identified comparable historic figures from Forbes' 2007 list of the richest Americans of all time, then calculated each individual's peak net worth as a percentage of U.S. GDP at the time. Those historical GDP shares were then applied to today's economy.

Note: Historical wealth estimates are approximate and may not represent individuals' exact peak fortunes. Carnegie's figure reflects proceeds from the sale of his steel business.

U.S. GDP reached an annualized $32.56 trillion in the second quarter ending Sept. 30. That means Musk's fortune equates to roughly 3.1% of the entire national economy - a higher percentage than any American before him.

Measuring historic wealth by modern-day standards is challenging because the underlying economic conditions have changed drastically. Additionally, readers should note that historical net-worth estimates are often debated due to differences in record-keeping and varying valuation methods. With that being said, economists typically measure historic wealth as a share of GDP instead of adjusting by standard consumer price inflation.

For example, Standard Oil founder John D. Rockefeller has long been considered the richest American in history. Rockefeller was worth $900 million at his peak in 1913, according to biographer Ron Chernow. Adjusted for inflation, his fortune would be worth $30.4 billion today. But when compared to U.S. GDP in 1913 - which was $39.5 billion, according to Measuring Worth - Rockefeller's wealth comprised 2.3% of total national output, or the equivalent of roughly $742 billion in today's economy.

Andrew Carnegie is believed to have given away $350 million, or roughly 90% of his fortune, over his lifetime. But to pinpoint his net worth at a specific point in time, MarketWatch used the 1901 buyout of Carnegie Steel to J.P Morgan as a benchmark for his peak wealth. While the exact amount is debated, PBS claims Carnegie walked away from the transaction with $250 million, earning him the title of the richest man in the world at the time. The proceeds of the sale represented 1.1% of U.S. GDP at the time, or the equivalent of $355 billion today.

-Christine Ji