Sergey Brin Falls To 5th Richest Amid Google Stock Plunge—Jeff Bezos Now 3rd
Jeff Bezos and Michael Dell became the world’s third- and fourth-richest people, respectively, on Thursday as Google’s Sergey Brin fell into the No. 5 spot following a nearly 7% plunge in Alphabet’s stock the day after the company reported its quarterly earnings.
Brin's net worth went down about $17.4 billion, or 6.71%, from Wednesday to an estimated $242.1 billion Thursday after a much larger-than-expected increase in AI spending drove a sharp decline in Alphabet's stock price.
The company on Wednesday reported its 12th straight quarter of double-digit revenue growth, but investors were spooked by a spike in its artificial intelligence capital spending forecast to between $195 billion and $205 billion.
Google was also on Thursday hit with a $1 billion fine from the European Union for breaking antitrust regulations, helping further drive down the share price.
The drop erased roughly $255 billion in market value, making it the largest one-day market capitalization loss in Alphabet's history.
Brin stepped down as president of Alphabet in 2019 but remains a board member and a controlling shareholder with an estimated 362.7 million shares, or about 3% of the company.
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has been one of the biggest winners of the artificial intelligence boom and its stock has risen this year as the market rewarded its investments in AI, cloud computing and products such as Gemini (which now reportedly boasts 950 million monthly users). The company reported a strong second quarter Wednesday, with revenue climbing 24% year over year to $119.8 billion and Google Cloud revenue surging 82%, but investors are concerned about the scale of its AI spending and that it may take too long to pay off. And Alphabet isn’t the only company whose investors have those concerns—Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle have all also experienced share price drops over worries about the cost of their AI pushes.
Dell's net worth has surged over the last year as Dell Technologies stock benefits from rapid growth in artificial intelligence infrastructure and soaring demand for AI servers. Dell's fortune climbed by tens of billions of dollars in 2026, including a single-day gain of about $35.8 billion in May after Dell Tech shares jumped more than 32% following a blockbuster earnings report. The rally has pushed Dell into the ranks of the world's wealthiest people thanks to his roughly 40% stake in Dell Technologies.