Interviewee Hao Fuman is the Director of the Institute of East Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore and former Director of the China Bureau of the World Bank. This article was transferred from First Financial on April 4th
Interviewee Hao Fuman is the Director of the Institute of East Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore and former Director of the China Bureau of the World Bank. This article was transferred from First Financial on April 4th.
Introduction: Musk has officially lost his position as the number one billionaire on the Forbes Rich List. On April 5th, Hao Fuman, director of the Institute of East Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore, tweeted, "Who else's Twitter interface has also experienced this kind of malfunction?" He referred to the fact that without warning, the iconic "blue bird" logo above the social media platform's Twitter homepage button has changed to the cryptocurrency Dogecoin's Chaigou avatar Doge. When a user opens a website through the desktop, the avatar also appears as a buffered icon. On the same day, Musk officially lost his position as the number one billionaire on the Forbes list and was replaced by Bernard Arnault, chairman of the French luxury goods giant LVMH Group.
The original Blue Bird logo was created in 2013 as a joke, with the aim of mocking other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. Last autumn, Tesla founder Elon Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion, and he is also a well-known super fan of the Doge emoticon pack. In February of this year, he even posted a tweet saying, "Twitter's new CEO is fantastic." The attached image shows a firewood dog sitting at a desk.
Musk is a passionate fan of Doge. After Twitter's webpage changed, the value of Dogcoin increased by more than 20% on April 3rd local time. As of the first financial reporter's press release, the dog coin has soared by 24.88% in the past five days. According to CoinMarketCap.com, Dogcoin is the eighth ranked cryptocurrency with a market value of over $13 billion.
Dog coins have undergone significant changes in value in the past few days
Building momentum for litigation? Musk quickly explained on Twitter the reason for the logo change, stating that it was "as promised". In March 2022, a Twitter user replied to Musk, suggesting that he acquire Twitter and change the logo to Doge. But more people suspect that this move may be Musk's retaliation against his alleged incident. In June last year, Musk was sued in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, accusing him of using his status as a billionaire to operate and manipulate a cryptocurrency pyramid scheme, in order to gain profits, exposure, and entertainment. The plaintiff claims that Musk purposefully pushed up the price of dog coins by more than 300 times over a period of two years, and all he did was to cause it to plummet, resulting in billions of dollars in losses. Currently, Musk and his team are fighting against these accusations.
Last week, Musk's lawyer stated in a document filed in the Manhattan Federal Court that the plaintiff in the case did not prove how Musk's statement in support of Dogcoin deceived anyone, nor did they explain what risks Musk had hidden from investors. There is nothing illegal about tweeting in support of a legitimate cryptocurrency or interesting images about it. This currency continues to hold a market value of nearly $10 billion. This court should stop the plaintiff's fantasies and dismiss the appeal, "the document said. Three days after Musk applied to the US federal court to dismiss the lawsuit against Dogcoin investors, the Twitter logo changed. Losing the title of world's richest man but filing a lawsuit is not Musk's only worry.
According to the annual World Billionaires List released by Forbes on the 4th, Musk has retired to the second richest person in the world, with an estimated value of $180 billion, a decrease of $39 billion from the previous year. The net assets of the new richest man, Arnault, have increased by over $50 billion in the past year, reaching $211 billion. Forbes explained that Musk's wealth shrank as he used $44 billion in Tesla stock to acquire Twitter, which scared investors and caused Tesla stock to plummet last year. Tesla has regained most of its lost land this year, but it is still much lower than the price before Musk purchased Twitter. Since purchasing Twitter last year, Tesla's stock price has fallen by nearly 50%.
For the world's new richest man, Arnold, Forbes claimed that he had a "glorious year" in 2022 because his luxury goods group's brand profits hit a new high. The stock price of LVMH has risen by 25% in the past year and has also recorded a significant increase this year.
Yan Wei, deputy partner of Roland Berger, who studies the luxury industry, told China Business News that some luxury groups' quarterly reports this year or annual reports last year showed impressive performance, and the "foam" component of their stock growth was not large.
Luxury goods emphasize more on the historical accumulation of the brand, and from the perspective of the overall environment (which is also providing support), "Yan Wei said, During the epidemic, the truly wealthy were not greatly affected, and even due to government or bank lending, they would have more money to invest, or could not even find investment opportunities. Their consumption ability would be stronger. In other words, the epidemic did not affect the pattern of the luxury goods market itself
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is the billionaire with the most shrinking wealth on the list, with a net worth decrease of $57 billion, which pushed him from second place to third place. This loss can be attributed to Amazon's stock losing nearly 40% of its value last year.
Forbes stated that the total number of billionaires on this year's list has dropped to 2640, down from 2668 last year and a second consecutive year of decline. The over 250 people who were listed last year did not appear on this year's list.
For the wealthiest people on Earth, this is another rare downward year, "said Chase Peterson Withorn, senior editor at Forbes Wealth
(Welcome to follow Renmin Chongyang Sina Weibo: @ Renmin Chongyang; WeChat official account: rdcy2013)
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