Jeff Bezos’s Path to Becoming the Richest Person on Earth by Bloomberg Graphics

Blink and you might have missed it: On July 27, 2017, 10:10AM, Jeff Bezos briefly became the world’s richest person. His stake in Amazon.com Inc. has soared nearly fivefold since the online retailer’s public debut two decades ago and hit as high as $86.5 billion that day. Amazon’s intraday price catapulted him past Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates as the world’s richest person, however by the end of regular trading, Bezos had slipped back to second place, behind Gates.

Anticipating this news, we created a timeline charting the fortunes and milestones of the (currently) five richest people in the world and their companies. Over the years, Seattle-based Amazon has expanded its product offerings and global footprint, introducing the Kindle book reader, adding cloud computing services, producing original television and film programming and selling the home voice recognition product Echo.