Larry Ellison Became the Richest Person in the World

Larry Ellison Became the Richest Person in the World

Why in News? 

According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index 2025, Larry Ellison became the world’s richest person. He surpassed Elon Musk, who had held the top spot for several years.

Top 10 Richest Persons – Bloomberg Billionaires Index (September 10, 2025)

The Richest Person in the World

• On 10 September 2025 the co-founder of Oracle, Larry Ellison reached a historic milestone by becoming the richest person in the world.
• He overtook Elon Musk, whose fortune had dominated the global rankings for almost a year.
• Ellison’s wealth soared in a single day by 101 billion dollars, the largest one-day personal gain ever recorded in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. 
• His net worth reached 393 billion dollars, pushing him ahead of Musk, whose fortune declined this time.
• The turning point came with Oracle’s earnings report released in 2025, which exceeded market expectations and demonstrated strong demand for cloud services. 
• The company’s stock rose by more than 40 percent in a single trading day, an event rarely seen at such scale. 
• Since Ellison owns nearly 41 percent of Oracle’s shares, this surge translated directly into his massive personal gain. 
• This achievement marked the first time in his 81 years that Ellison became the richest individual on earth.

Who is Larry Ellison?

• Early Life: Larry Ellison (Lawrence Joseph Ellison) born on August 17, 1944, in New York City, is one of the most recognized figures in the global technology industry. His biological mother was a young unmarried woman, and his father served as a pilot in the United States Army Air Corps. Ellison grew up in a modest household with adoptive parents, where he learned resilience at an early age.

• Education: Ellison studied in South Shore High School in Chicago and later enrolled at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. In 1966, after a short stay at the University of Chicago, he was introduced to computer design for the first time. He moved to California, where he worked as a computer programmer.

• Career: In 1977, with two partners and a small personal investment of about 1,200 dollars, Ellison co-founded a company called Software Development Laboratories. The company later became known as Oracle Corporation, inspired by a project he once worked on that was connected to the Central Intelligence Agency. 

• Oracle quickly grew and by the early 1980s, the company became a strong player in the software industry.

• • Ellison served as the chief executive officer of Oracle from 1977 to 2014. For 37 years, he held this position and transformed Oracle from a small start-up into one of the largest software companies in the world. 
  • In 2014, he stepped down as CEO but remained deeply connected to the company as its executive chairman and chief technology officer. He played a vital role in guiding Oracle into cloud computing, which later became a core part of its global business. 
  • Under his leadership, Oracle acquired companies like Sun Microsystems in 2010 and NetSuite in 2016.
  • Ellison appeared consistently in the Forbes billionaire rankings, and in 2024, he was also named among the world’s most influential people.

What is the Bloomberg Billionaires Index?

• About: The Bloomberg Billionaires Index is a global ranking system that tracks the fortunes of the world’s wealthiest people.

• It has become one of the most followed resources for understanding changes in personal wealth across different industries. 

• • • The main aim of the index is to give readers a clear understanding of how the fortunes of billionaires rise and fall depending on stock market movements, company earnings, and global economic trends.

• The index was launched in March 2012 by Bloomberg News with the purpose of providing a transparent picture of billionaire wealth.

• Since 2012, it has grown into a daily record of the top 500 richest individuals around the world.

• Features: Each billionaire listed has a detailed profile that explains the sources of their wealth, the industries they are connected with, and how their fortunes shift over time. 

• The index is updated every day after the New York stock market closes, which reflects the most current valuation of assets.

• • • The entire index is available on the Bloomberg Terminal, where users can compare fortunes across industries, regions, and countries using different tools.
    • This index showcases the top 500 richest names worldwide which remains the current standard. 

• Evolution: The Bloomberg Billionaires Index uses a combination of public and private data to calculate fortunes. 
• For publicly traded companies, it relies on share prices and disclosed holdings, while for private companies it estimates valuations by comparing them with similar listed firms. 
• All figures are converted into US dollars using current exchange rates, and the calculations exclude personal debt.