Amazon boss surpasses Bill Gates to become the richest person in the world

Amazon shares surged after a strong earnings forecast, pushing Jeff Bezos' fortune to $90.9 billion.

Amazon's stock price rose 1.3% in the early US session on the evening of July 27, to $1,065, bringing Jeff Bezos's fortune to $90.9 billion, $0.2 billion more than Bill Gates. If this figure is maintained until the end of the session, Bezos will officially surpass Gates in the Bloomberg billionaire ranking. The Microsoft co-founder has held this position since May 2013.

Amazon is set to report its second-quarter earnings on Wednesday, but analysts polled by Bloomberg expect revenue of $37.2 billion, up 22% from the same period last year.

No billionaire has done better this year than the Amazon CEO. Photo: Forbes

Bezos currently owns 17% of Amazon shares. The company's stock has increased 40% this year, as of yesterday, helping him add $24.5 billion. Since the beginning of the year, Bezos has also been continuously predicted to take the richest position on the planet from Bill Gates, when he successively surpassed investment legend Warren Buffett and Zara owner Amancio Ortega.

Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg is still in fifth place. However, the stock price increase after yesterday's positive profit report has helped the young billionaire gain an additional $136 million.

Investors and analysts are closely watching Amazon’s moves into businesses like fashion and food. They are also interested in how many more subscribers it can get to its premium membership service, Amazon Prime, because these people spend more money than regular customers.

The figures for the cloud computing segment - Amazon Web Services - are also highly anticipated. This is a fast-growing, profitable business segment that currently contributes 10% of the company's revenue. Amazon is the leading name in the cloud computing segment, despite facing fierce competition from Microsoft and Alphabet - Google's parent company.

According to VNE