Topline
Larry Ellison on Monday became the world’s eighth-richest person, falling behind Nvidia’s Jensen Huang as a monthlong selloff has nearly halved the Oracle chairman’s fortune amid growing concerns about the cloud giant’s AI spending.
Key Facts
Shares of Oracle plunged more than 5% as of Monday afternoon to below $133, extending a 47% decline since an intraday high of $250 on June 1.
Ellison—who holds about 40% Oracle equity—had his net worth cut by $8 billion, to $175.2 billion, ranking him directly behind Huang ($176.3 billion), whose fortune was reduced by $6 billion following a 3.4% dip in Nvidia shares, according to Forbes’ estimates.
That marks a $124.8 billion decline in Ellison’s wealth since it eclipsed $300 billion on June 1, when he ranked the world’s second-richest person, behind Elon Musk.
More analysts have questioned Oracle’s plans to spend about $70 billion through its current fiscal year, even as the company said the figure could be up to $25 billion higher: Melius Research analysts wrote in a note last week that Oracle’s spending plans may not hold if OpenAI or Anthropic demands more computing capacity.
S&P Global downgraded Oracle’s credit rating on Thursday, arguing its “rapidly expanding” AI infrastructure business could pay off, but may be too expensive and could weaken Oracle’s financial position in the meantime.
big number
$494 billion. That’s how much Oracle’s market valuation has fallen since peaking at $877.1 billion in September, falling to about $383 billion as of Monday. The company was valued at roughly $649 billion at the end of May.
tangent
Musk’s net worth Monday dropped below $900 billion for the first time since before SpaceX’s initial public offering, as the rocket maker’s shares dropped more than 5%. The latest selloff in SpaceX shares cut $45.7 billion from Musk’s wealth, now valued at $871.6 billion.
key background
Oracle, like its competitors, has ramped up efforts to develop its cloud and AI offerings. The company’s stock briefly rallied ahead of its latest earnings report in early June, when Wall Street anticipated more than $660 billion in backlog orders as a signal that Oracle’s aggressive buildup strategy was successful. Ellison’s firm, despite beating out quarterly revenue and earnings projections, disappointed as Vital analyst Adam Crisafulli called Oracle’s sales guidance for fiscal year 2027 a “disappointment.” Crisafulli pointed to Oracle reiterating prior guidance of $90 billion in total revenue for the year, arguing a similar move from Broadcom not to raise projections “underwhelmed investors too.”