Jeff Bezos can afford to lose some billions.
Amazon’s CEO shed a cool $19.2 billion over two consecutive trading days (Oct. 26 and Oct. 29, separated by the weekend) as his company’s stock plunged nearly 14% over the same period. It was the most any rich person had ever lost in a two-day window, Bloomberg reported, besting (worsting?) the dubious record held by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who lost $16.5 billion when his company missed earnings estimates in July.
Despite the massive loss, Bezos is still comfortably the richest person in the world, with a net worth of $133 billion as of the end of October, roughly 40% greater than the $94.2 billion fortune of no. 2 Bill Gates.
Of course, one reason Bezos has such a large lead is that, unlike Gates, he hasn’t donated much to charity. Gates had donated $35.8 billion to his charitable foundation, or 27% of his personal fortune, as of September—the most of anyone in the world, according to an analysis by Forbes. Bezos only recently waded into the charitable-giving waters, announcing in September a $2 billion charitable fund for preschool in low-income communities and to help the homeless.
Anyway, after a dismal couple of days, Bezos’s wealth recovered a bit on Oct. 31, gaining back $5.4 billion as Amazon’s stock rallied 4.4%. Happy Halloween!