Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos briefly surpasses Bill Gates as world’s richest

Jeff Bezos became the richest person in the world for a couple hours Thursday morning.

Bezos’ net worth topped $90 billion, but a dip in Amazon stock market prices later reduced that to $88.8 billion, according to CNN Money. Bezos now sits behind Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates who, with an estimated net worth of $89.8 billion, has held the top spot spot since 2013.

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The momentary shuffle followed a report from Fortune and Bloomberg that Amazon stock prices jumped by more than $15 a share. Bezos owns just under 80 million shares of Amazon — 17 percent of the company — which put his fortune at more than $90 billion. By the close of market day, Amazon shares fell 0.7 percent.

The Amazon website originally launched in 1995, selling mostly books. Since then, the company has transformed how people shop for everything, sending revenue numbers soaring while causing other retailers to suffer.

In June, Amazon purchased Whole Foods. That purchase was made as the company tests Amazon Go, a brick-and-mortar store that utilizes technology in lieu of checkout counters.

The Whole Foods purchase has led some to wonder if we will only have a few retailers in the future.

“It’s starting to feel like that isn’t it,” CBS News Business Analyst Jill Schlesinger previously said.

What makes Amazon such a threatening foe for other retailers is the company’s history of making things more efficient, she pointed out.

But it’s not just Bezos who is cashing in Amazon’s success — although he is doing so at a much higher level. This week, the retail giant announced it will hire 50,000 workers, making “thousands of on-the-spot job offers to qualified candidates” around the country. That announcement seems to coincide with the company’s plan to hire 100,000 full-time workers by 2018.

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