Austin, Texas - Elon Musk has become the first person estimated to reach a net worth of $500 billion, largely thanks to his Tesla and SpaceX shares, according to a Forbes estimate.

Forbes calculated Musk's wealth at roughly $150 billion more than Oracle co-founder and fellow far-right billionaire Larry Ellison. The magazine later revised the estimate slightly down to $499.1 billion.

The X owner's wealth is harder to estimate than that of other billionaires because many of his companies are not publicly traded.

Musk surpassed the $400 billion mark in December 2024, amid investor speculation that Tesla would benefit from his connections to then-newly elected President Donald Trump. He frequently visited the White House early in Trump's term, but their relationship soon imploded and Trump threatened to cut federal support to Musk's firms.

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Tesla sales also softened, partly because some potential buyers were put off by Musk's extreme right-wing political views and his role in Trump's dismantling of large swaths of the administrative state.

The carmaker's stock has since rebounded, bolstered by expectations for growth in robotaxis and robotics, and possibly by a spike in sales ahead of the expiration of federal electric vehicle incentives in late September.

Musk's portfolio also includes X, AI developer xAI and neural implant company Neuralink. Tesla, however, remains central to his fortune.

The electric carmaker is offering a compensation plan potentially worth $1 trillion, contingent on achieving eightfold market value growth, maintaining Musk as chief executive and fulfilling other performance conditions.