It turns out 2022 was a financial face plant of a year for many of the world’s richest of the rich — including Nike co-founder Phil Knight.

The Beaverton billionaire finished the year with a fortune estimated at $43.8 billion, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index, a daily tally of the ups and downs of the 1% of the richest 1%.

That’s down from a peak of over $60 billion in November 2021. 

Knight finished the year just outside of the Top 25 richest people in the world, ranking 26th.

Knight’s wealth is more than the total bottom half of Oregon’s 4.2 million population, according to a report this month by the Oregon Center for Public Policy, a progressive think tank.

Despite the drop in fortune, Knight still found $7.75 million to spend on two losing candidates for Oregon governor — non-affiliated candidate Betsy Johnson and Republican Christine Drazan.

Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index lists the daily gyrations of the countdown of the 500 wealthiest people in the world. At the nine-figure worth of some on the list, daily gains and losses for one of the top billionaires can top $2.5 billion in a day.

To qualify for the top 500 list currently requires a fortune of at least $5.15 billion — with two brothers who own the Brazilian mining company Araxa taking the final two spots at the bottom.

That means Oregon’s two other billionaires besides Knight — Dutch Brothers CEO Travis Boersma and Columbia Sportswear CEO Tim Boyle — don’t qualify, with their estimated personal fortunes each totaling just above $2 billion.

Knight’s financial lumps in 2022 were relatively mild compared to some of the famous names on the list. Due to stock market undulation and personal issues such as divorce settlements, some of the world’s wealthiest took a big hit to their humongous wallets, Bloomberg reported.

Tech titan Mark Zuckerberg, the builder of the Facebook colossus, ended 2022 worth just $2 billion more than Knight.

Bloomberg reported Zuckerberg was worth $45.6 billion at the end of last year. That was a rebound from a low point of $35.2 billion in mid-November 2022, but a cliff dive from $125 billion at the end of 2021.

The losses deflated Zuckerberg’s worth below the fortunes of multiple Google founders, veteran investor Warren Buffet, Kansas industrialist and conservative political bankroller Charles Koch, along with Julia Koch, the widow of his brother David Koch.

Zuckerberg also dropped behind Mexican cellphone king Carlos Slim, various Chinese plutocrats, an Indian oil refinery tycoon, a French cosmetics king, and a Spanish clothing retailer.

The social media network and artificial reality ventures Zuckerberg runs brought him less money than the individual worth of a trio of descendants of the late Walmart founder Sam Walton, and two heirs to the Mars candy company (M&Ms, Snickers, Milky Way).

Famous tech names littered the losers on the list of billionaires as several onetime investor darlings hobbled through the past twelve months.

As of the last week of December, Microsoft’s Bill Gates had lost a quarter of his former $137.8 billion bankroll. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos lost two-thirds of his former $192.5 billion worth.

Both divorced in the past three years. Gates and his wife of 27 years, Melinda French Gates, divorced in 2021. Bezos and his wife, McKenzie Scott, divorced in 2019 after 26 years.  

But nobody could beat the financial volatility of Elon Musk, the entrepreneur behind Tesla electric cars, Space X rockets and the Twitter social media platform. He lost an unrivaled $120 billion last year, according to Bloomberg. The richest man in the world at the beginning of 2022 with a worth pegged at $279 billion, Musk finished 2022 at $137 billion. 

Losing more money than anyone on the Bloomberg list still left Musk as the second richest person in the world. Musk, who described himself last year as “Chief Twit” of Twitter, went on his social media site near year’s end to forecast a financial resurrection in 2023.

“Long-term fundamentals are extremely strong,” Musk tweeted Dec. 30. “Short-term market madness is unpredictable.”

Stephen Diamond, a law professor at Santa Clara University specializing in securities law and corporate governance, told Bloomberg this week that the whiplash Musk has caused investors in his projects “boggles the mind.”

“With Twitter, he bit off more than he could chew,” Diamond said. “He’s now trapped himself financially.”

With Musk’s worth in high speed reverse, the title of richest of the rich at the end of 2022 went to Bernard Arnhault, the Frenchman whose $148 billion fortune is built on an empire of luxury products he runs from his 150-year-old Chateau Chevel Blanc in Bordeaux.

Arnhault sells riches to the rich, who want symbols of their 9, 8 or merely 7-figure fortunes — Tiffany jewelry, Louis Vuitton bags, Christian Dior gowns, Dom Perignon champagne, TAG Heur watches, Sephora perfume.

Bloomberg recently wrote that financial analysts it interview felt Arnhault had little to worry about losing his gilded perch at No. 1.

Musk would need a major turnaround to regain the top spot. His worth has dropped $7.6 billion since New Year’s Day. Bloomberg recently put Musk’s worth at $129 billion.

Meanwhile, Arnhault has seen his fortune rise $15.6 billion since Jan. 1 as the holiday shopping sales from December 2022 have flowed onto his books.

At the current pace, Musk is in danger of falling behind the No. 3 wealthiest person in the world, diamond trader-turned-industrialist Gautam Adani of India. As of last week, he’s worth $119 billion.

Musk could even lose the ranking as the wealthiest American. Bezos, also riding profits from the holidays for Amazon, was listed last week at $113 billion, up just under $6 billion since Jan. 1.

The losses piled up by Musk have attracted wide attention. The Guinness Book of World Records announced earlier this month that the Musk’s estimated loss of $182 billion since November 2021 had shattered the world record for lost wealth.

The previous mark was set in 2000 when Japanese tech magnate Masayoshi Son lost the equivalent of $58 billion in today’s dollars. Son currently ranks as the 139th wealthiest person in the world, with his SoftBank conglomerate holdings worth $13.2 billion.

Musk still has a long, long way to go before his bank account runs dry. He’s still worth six times the mere $20 billion he had at the end of 2019. 

Richest in the world this week

The ranking of the top 26 richest people in the world as of Jan. 11, 2003 by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Rank     Name         Total net worth    Country    Company/Industry

1     Bernard Arnault        $178.0B           France     Luxury products

2     Elon Musk                $129.0B            U.S.       Tesla, Twitter

3    Gautam Adani            $119.0B           India      Ports, construction

4     Jeff Bezos                 $113.0B           U.S.        Amazon 

5    Warren Buffett            $110.0B           U.S.       Investor     

6    Bill Gates                    $109.0B           U.S.           Microsoft

7    Larry Ellison                  $95.9B          U.S.            Oracle

8    Mukesh Ambani             $88.5B            India        Oil refining

9    Larry Page                    $83.3B            U.S.          Google

10  Steve Ballmer                $82.4B            U.S.         Microsoft

11  Carlos Slim                    $80.0B            Mexico      Telecom    

12  Sergey Brin                   $79.8B            U.S.          Google

13  F.B. Meyers                    $78.0B           France       L’ Oreal 

14  Zhong Shanshan            $68.9B           China        Technology

15  Charles Koch                  $68.4B           U.S.          Industrial

16  Julia Flesher Koch           $68.4B           U.S.          Industrial

17  Jim Walton                     $65.3B           U.S.          Walmart

18  Rob Walton                     $64.6B           U.S.          Walmart

19  Alice Walton                    $63.0B           U.S.          Walmart

20  Amancio Ortega              $58.6B           Spain         Clothing

21  Jacqueline B. Mars           $55.0B            U.S.         Candy

22  John Mars                       $55.0B            U.S.         Candy

23  Zhang Yiming                  $54.9B          China         TikTok

24  Mark Zuckerberg              $50.1B            U.S.        Facebook

25  Michael Dell                     $49.7B            U.S.        Computers

26  Phil Knight                       $46.6B            U.S.        Sportwear

Source: Bloomberg