Coronavirus: 500 of the world's richest lose close to 444 billion dollars

Last week may have been the most expensive one this year for the world's billionaires. Global stock markets witnessed a bloodbath due to the coronavirus outbreak.

What was the fallout?

500 of the world's richest lost close to 444 billion dollars. The week's biggest loser was Jeff Bezos. and joining him were Bill Gates and Elon Musk among others. 

The coronavirus may be the biggest enemy yet for the fortunes of the world's billionaires. The deadly virus has put the world's economy in survival mode even as governments around the world are bracing for a recession.

The optimistic narrative about 2020 causing a rebound in global growth ---- is slowly fading away and the fortunes of the world's richest are falling drastically.

According to a report by the Bloomberg billionaires index,  financial hits have erased 78 billion dollars in gains, the gains which the world's 500 wealthiest people had amassed since 2020 began.

The last week of February turned out to be the most expensive with 444 billion dollars of the world's billionaires wealth got erased. 

Jeff Bezos tops the list with lose of 11.9 billion dollars, followed by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates who suffered loss of  10 billion dollars.

French business magnate Bernand Arnault who got scorched with losses upto 9.1 billion dollars. Nearly 80% of the billionaires on Bloomberg's wealth ranking are now in the red which includes world's 25th richest man Elon Musk with losses upto 9 billion dollars and CEO Berkshire Hathaway Warren Buffet who took a hit of 8.8 billion dollars.