Bernard Arnault doesn’t really get the recognition he deserves. If I asked 100 random people on the street to name the richest people in the world, I bet not one person would remember Mr. Aranult. In fact, I just asked a few friends to name the 5 richest people in the world – a totally scientific experiment – and, just as I predicted, no one named Bernard Arnault. No one remembered Gautam Adani either. Spoiler: As of this writing, Bernard Arnault is the world’s second richest person. Gautam Adani is #3! So if my intuition is correct, 100 random people on the street would not be able to name the world’s second and third richest citizens. I bet most of those 100 people wouldn’t be able to name the men if shown a photo of their faces. That’s a little crazy, no?
To make the above revelations even crazier, this week Bernard Arnault rose to within striking distance of becoming the richest person on the planet.
To familiarize yourself with the man who is very much on pace to dethrone Elon Musk as the richest person in the world, here’s a recent photo of Bernard Arnault:
(Photo by VALERY HACHE/AFP via Getty Images)
Not a bad looking guy for a billionaire business tycoon, right?
Well…
Just to drive home my point about how most people probably wouldn’t be able to recognize Bernard Arnault if they were shown a photo of him…
The photo above is not Bernard Arnault. That’s an actor named Tcheky Karyo.
I found Tcheky’s photo by searching Getty Images for “french actor.” Now that I’ve Googled him, I recognize him from the 2000 Mel Gibson movie “The Patriot.”
Ok so for real, this is Bernard Arnault:
(Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images)
Got ya again!
The above photo is indeed a French billionaire, but that’s Francois Pinault, the founder of conglomerate Kering which owns brands like Gucci, Brioni, Balanciaga (awkward) and Yves Saint Laurent. Believe it or not, Francois Pinault is Salma Hayek’s father in law. That is a true story. Salma has been married to Francois’ son, Francois Henri Pinault, since 2009.
Ok all joking aside, for real, this is Bernard Arnault:
(Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images)
Familiarize yourself with that face. If Tesla’s stock price continues declining – it’s down nearly 60% year-to-date – then pretty soon Bernard Arnault will be the richest person in the world. A year ago Elon’s net worth was $340 billion. At the start of 2022, his net worth was $270 billion. Thanks to that precipitous decline in Tesla’s stock price, Elon’s net worth has fallen $100 billion this year so far. In the same period, Bernard’s net worth has fallen as well, about $10 billion.
And for just a bit of history, Bernard has actually been the second richest person in the world for longer than you might think. He first accomplished that feat in May 2021.
Arnault and his immediate family own more than 47% of LVMH, which is the world’s largest maker of luxury goods. The company currently has a market cap of $382 billion.