The world’s 500 wealthiest individuals collectively lost $108 billion on Monday, with Nvidia co-founder Jensen Huang taking the biggest hit, as a tech-sector selloff linked to Chinese AI developer DeepSeek triggered a sharp market decline.
Billionaires with significant investments in artificial intelligence bore the brunt of the losses. Huang’s net worth plummeted by $20.1 billion, a 20% drop, while Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle Corp, saw an even larger absolute decline of $22.6 billion, though this represented a 12% decrease in his fortune, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Other major losses included Michael Dell, who saw his fortune shrink by $13 billion, and Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, who lost $12.1 billion. Overall, the technology sector accounted for $94 billion of the total wealth decline, making up about 85% of the Bloomberg index’s downturn. The stock market reflected the turmoil, with the Nasdaq Composite Index dropping 3.1% and the S&P 500 falling 1.5%.
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DeepSeek’s Unexpected Rise Shakes AI Industry
DeepSeek, an AI company based in Hangzhou, has been working on AI models since 2023 but gained global attention over the weekend when its free DeepSeek R1 chatbot topped worldwide download charts. The surge in new users overwhelmed its servers, leading to service outages and forcing the company to limit signups to users with Chinese phone numbers.
The emergence of DeepSeek challenges the common Silicon Valley narrative that massive investments are necessary to build cutting-edge AI systems. The company claims that its model was developed for just $5.6 million, a fraction of what major Western AI firms spend. This revelation dealt a serious blow to tech billionaires whose wealth is tied to the AI supply chain, which has been a key driver of the stock market over the past two years.
AI Hyperscalers Feel the Impact
Tech giants such as Meta, Alphabet, and Microsoft have amassed billions in value by aggressively investing in AI since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in 2022. Their strategy has largely relied on massive spending to build and maintain AI systems, hoarding high-end semiconductors and securing vast energy supplies to keep their models running.
DeepSeek’s rapid success raises questions about this high-cost approach, shaking investor confidence in the dominance of Western AI companies and reshaping market expectations for the future of artificial intelligence development.
