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Elon Musk adds $82.2B to net worth in 2020 after TSLA stock surge
Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s net worth has increased by over $82 billion in 2020 after a 480% increase in stock price so far this year.
Musk, who helped found Tesla in 2003, is the company’s largest shareholder, and as CEO, helps oversee the company’s day-to-day operations. 2020 has been especially rewarding for the South African-born CEO, who has helped the company establish itself as the electric vehicle tech leader by a considerable margin during the year.
With advancements in battery production, EV tech, and manufacturing techniques, Tesla has seen its share price explode from $86 to over $500 in just over eleven months. Tesla has also reported five consecutive profitable quarters, which has helped its performance on Wall Street.
As for Musk, his considerable wealth has already grown substantially this year. According to Forbes, Musk was worth $24.6B in April 2020, when a steady climb in price per share began and lasted until July. After a short drop in mid-August, TSLA shares once again skyrocketed until August 31st, when the automaker announced a 5:1 stock split to make shares more affordable for retail and younger investors.
As a result of the split, TSLA has overtaken AAPL as millennial’s go-to stock, and the automaker has experienced overwhelming popularity among retail investors.
Musk’s proverbial climb up the World’s Richest list has been monumental, although it is important to highlight the fact that his worth has nothing to do with cash. The CEO doesn’t accept a paycheck from his employer, and under California Law, his minimum salary is left in a Tesla-owned bank account, which is untouched.
Musk’s net worth growth has inspired some politicians, like Bernie Sanders, to ask CEO’s with exponential growth in wealth throughout the year to pay a one-time tax. The bill, which would have required Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and the Walton family to pay billions, was never passed.
Bernie Sanders wants Elon Musk to pay a one-time $27.5 billion tax
Musk is set to, once again, surpass Zuckerberg on the list after the surge in stock price added $7.6 billion to his net worth over the past two days. Tesla stock has surged nearly $100 in the past two days, or around 25%, based on the report that the electric automaker’s inclusion in the S&P 500 index. TSLA will join the S&P on December 21st.
As of the end of trading hours on Wednesday, Musk is worth $106.9B, but this number will likely grow based on TSLA’s increase in value during Thursday trading hours. At the time of writing, TSLA shares were up $14.27, or 2.93%, to $500.91 per share.
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Starlink goes mainstream with first-ever SpaceX Super Bowl advertisement
SpaceX used the Super Bowl broadcast to promote Starlink, pitching the service as fast, affordable broadband available across much of the world.
SpaceX aired its first-ever Super Bowl commercial on Sunday, marking a rare move into mass-market advertising as it seeks to broaden adoption of its Starlink satellite internet service.
Starlink Super Bowl advertisement
SpaceX used the Super Bowl broadcast to promote Starlink, pitching the service as fast, affordable broadband available across much of the world.
The advertisement highlighted Starlink’s global coverage and emphasized simplified customer onboarding, stating that users can sign up for service in minutes through the company’s website or by phone in the United States.
The campaign comes as SpaceX accelerates Starlink’s commercial expansion. The satellite internet service grew its global user base in 2025 to over 9 million subscribers and entered several dozen additional markets, as per company statements.
Starlink growth and momentum
Starlink has seen notable success in numerous regions across the globe. Brazil, in particular, has become one of Starlink’s largest growth regions, recently surpassing one million users, as per Ookla data. The company has also expanded beyond residential broadband into aviation connectivity and its emerging direct-to-cellular service.
Starlink has recently offered aggressive promotions in select regions, including discounted or free hardware, waived installation fees, and reduced monthly pricing. Some regions even include free Starlink Mini for select subscribers. In parallel, SpaceX has introduced AI-driven tools to streamline customer sign-ups and service selection.
The Super Bowl appearance hints at a notable shift for Starlink, which previously relied largely on organic growth and enterprise contracts. The ad suggests SpaceX is positioning Starlink as a mainstream alternative to traditional broadband providers.
Tesla engineers deflected calls from Apple on a daily basis while the tech giant was developing its now-defunct electric vehicle program, which was known as “Project Titan.”
Back in 2022 and 2023, Apple was developing an EV in a top-secret internal fashion, hoping to launch it by 2028 with a fully autonomous driving suite.
However, Apple bailed on the project in early 2024, as Project Titan abandoned the project in an email to over 2,000 employees. The company had backtracked its expectations for the vehicle on several occasions, initially hoping to launch it with no human driving controls and only with an autonomous driving suite.
Apple canceling its EV has drawn a wide array of reactions across tech
It then planned for a 2028 launch with “limited autonomous driving.” But it seemed to be a bit of a concession at that point; Apple was not prepared to take on industry giants like Tesla.
Wedbush’s Dan Ives noted in a communication to investors that, “The writing was on the wall for Apple with a much different EV landscape forming that would have made this an uphill battle. Most of these Project Titan engineers are now all focused on AI at Apple, which is the right move.”
Apple did all it could to develop a competitive EV that would attract car buyers, including attempting to poach top talent from Tesla.
In a new podcast interview with Tesla CEO Elon Musk, it was revealed that Apple had been calling Tesla engineers nonstop during its development of the now-defunct project. Musk said the engineers “just unplugged their phones.”
Musk said in full:
“They were carpet bombing Tesla with recruiting calls. Engineers just unplugged their phones. Their opening offer without any interview would be double the compensation at Tesla.”
Interestingly, Apple had acquired some ex-Tesla employees for its project, like Senior Director of Engineering Dr. Michael Schwekutsch, who eventually left for Archer Aviation.
Tesla took no legal action against Apple for attempting to poach its employees, as it has with other companies. It came after EV rival Rivian in mid-2020, after stating an “alarming pattern” of poaching employees was noticed.
There are a lot of Tesla bulls out there who have astronomical expectations for the company, especially as its arm of reach has gone well past automotive and energy and entered artificial intelligence and robotics.
However, some of the most bullish Tesla investors believe the company could become worth $100 trillion, and CEO Elon Musk does not believe that number is completely out of the question, even if it sounds almost ridiculous.
To put that number into perspective, the top ten most valuable companies in the world — NVIDIA, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, TSMC, Meta, Saudi Aramco, Broadcom, and Tesla — are worth roughly $26 trillion.
Will Tesla join the fold? Predicting a triple merger with SpaceX and xAI
Cathie Wood of ARK Invest believes the number is reasonable considering Tesla’s long-reaching industry ambitions:
“…in the world of AI, what do you have to have to win? You have to have proprietary data, and think about all the proprietary data he has, different kinds of proprietary data. Tesla, the language of the road; Neuralink, multiomics data; nobody else has that data. X, nobody else has that data either. I could see $100 trillion. I think it’s going to happen because of convergence. I think Tesla is the leading candidate [for $100 trillion] for the reason I just said.”
Musk said late last year that all of his companies seem to be “heading toward convergence,” and it’s started to come to fruition. Tesla invested in xAI, as revealed in its Q4 Earnings Shareholder Deck, and SpaceX recently acquired xAI, marking the first step in the potential for a massive umbrella of companies under Musk’s watch.
SpaceX officially acquires xAI, merging rockets with AI expertise
Now that it is happening, it seems Musk is even more enthusiastic about a massive valuation that would swell to nearly four-times the value of the top ten most valuable companies in the world currently, as he said on X, the idea of a $100 trillion valuation is “not impossible.”
It’s not impossible
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 6, 2026
Tesla is not just a car company. With its many projects, including the launch of Robotaxi, the progress of the Optimus robot, and its AI ambitions, it has the potential to continue gaining value at an accelerating rate.
Musk’s comments show his confidence in Tesla’s numerous projects, especially as some begin to mature and some head toward their initial stages.
Starlink goes mainstream with first-ever SpaceX Super Bowl advertisement
Tesla engineers deflected calls from this tech giant’s now-defunct EV project
