Elon Musk, the richest man on the planet, is one step away from becoming the world's first trillionaire – an amazing fortune, unprecedented in the history of human commerce, reports CNN. A trillion dollars is 1000 billion dollars.
Musk already owns $273 billion worth of stock thanks to his role as CEO of Tesla.
But if the initial public offering of SpaceX — his rocket and artificial intelligence company — goes ahead as planned next week, Musk's fortune could grow by another $841 billion.
In total, that's $1.11 trillion for Musk from his two publicly traded companies alone.
CNN notes that it would be impossible to spend that much money in one lifetime. Even if someone spent $1 million every hour, every day, it would still take more than a century to spend $1 trillion.
However, this wealth is on paper, not cash in bank accounts. The value depends strictly on how investors continue to value Tesla and SpaceX.
To better understand what that amount means, CNN presents some things that will soon be worth less than Elon Musk's fortune.
The economies of most countries
Globally, only 20 countries have savings greater than $1.1 trillion, according to the International Monetary Fund. That means most countries in the world have an economy worth less than Musk's estimated fortune.
These include Taiwan ($977 billion), Ireland ($779 billion), Sweden ($760 billion) and Singapore ($660 billion), along with Musk's native South Africa ($480 billion).
All properties in Houston
Houston is the third largest city in the US, after New York and Los Angeles. The Texas city, located on the Gulf Coast, is a major hub for the US oil and gas industry.
All property in the city, both residential and commercial, is worth about $879 billion in total, according to the latest available data.
All new cars bought in the USA
After homes, cars and trucks are among Americans' biggest expenses.
The average price of a new car hit a record high of $48,402 last year, including all sales. Americans bought 16.3 million new cars in 2025, totaling $789 billion.
Other tech billionaires
Musk is already the richest person in the world, but his net worth could further set him apart from other tech billionaires.
Even when adding up the wealth estimates of the next four richest people — Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos — their combined wealth of $1.09 trillion still falls short of what Musk is on track to have.
Like Musk, they all made their fortunes from the stocks of the tech firms they founded.
