Overview

• Bloomberg adjusted the appreciation rates for Gates’s assets to better account for his outside charitable giving.
• The recalculation shaved roughly $52 billion, or 30 percent, off his estimated wealth, moving him from fifth to twelfth place.
• Steve Ballmer, who retained about a 4 percent stake in Microsoft, rose to fifth richest with a net worth of $172 billion.
• The Gates Foundation has disbursed over $60 billion by the end of 2024 and pledged to spend $200 billion by 2045 before winding down.
• Analysts say the shift in rankings reflects Gates’s intentional philanthropy rather than any deterioration in his investment performance.