Larry Ellison, 80, is now world's second richest person — Oracle chairman Larry Ellison

Larry Ellison is the world’s second-wealthiest person for the first time ever, as a red-hot rally in Oracle’s share price has catapulted his net worth to US$251.2-billion.

Oracle has been a key winner as investors have piled into artificial intelligence stocks. The company’s shares have nearly tripled since ChatGPT was released to the public in November 2022, but it’s been on a particular tear over the past three months, with the stock gaining more than 90% since late April as the computing provider recorded surging revenues and inked key partnerships.

Oracle’s shares rose 5.7% on Tuesday on news that the US government would allow chip makers including Nvidia and AMD to export some semiconductors to China, reversing Biden-era restrictions. That pushed Ellison, 80, ahead of Mark Zuckerberg on Bloomberg’s wealth index. More than 80% of Ellison’s wealth is in the form of Oracle stock and options.

In the past few months alone, Oracle has tallied tens of billions of dollars in cloud computing contracts and announced it’s developing gigawatts of data centre power to serve enterprise clients including OpenAI, which rented a massive amount of additional capacity earlier this month as part of the companies’ Stargate initiative with SoftBank Group.

Its revenue last quarter blew by estimates, with CEO Safra Catz saying that “FY26 will be even better”.

Ellison is planning new ways to leverage his soaring wealth. On Tuesday, he announced in a post on X that he would be amending his support for the Giving Pledge to concentrate more of his resources on the Ellison Institute of Technology, an interdisciplinary technical institute that’s partnered with the University of Oxford. The institute, which was founded in 2023, focuses on innovating in diverse fields including health, agriculture, clean energy and artificial intelligence.

Musk still top

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s wealth has also been boosted by a recent run-up in his company’s stock: Huang overtook Warren Buffett to move into ninth place on Bloomberg’s rich list for the first time on Friday, where he’s remained since. Nearly all of Huang’s wealth is in Nvidia equity, according to Bloomberg’s wealth index.