Google co-founder Sergey Brin, 52, has climbed to the third spot on the global rich list, overtaking Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Oracle chairman Larry Ellison. According to Bloomberg’s billionaire index, Brin’s net worth jumped by $4.9 billion to $255.6 billion.
He now ranks behind fellow Google co-founder Larry Page and Tesla chief Elon Musk, whose fortunes stand at $277 billion and $725.3 billion, respectively. With this rise, Brin has moved ahead of Bezos, whose net worth is estimated at $253.2 billion, and Ellison, valued at $251.3 billion.
Alphabet hits $4 trillion milestone
The surge in Brin’s wealth came after Google-parent Alphabet Inc. became the fourth company in the world to cross a market valuation of $4 trillion. It joined Nvidia, Microsoft and Apple in reaching the milestone this week. A key trigger for Alphabet’s latest rally was a new artificial intelligence partnership with Apple.
Earlier this week, the iPhone maker announced it would work with Google to use the tech giant’s Gemini models as the foundation for its own AI systems and the next generation of Siri.
AI at the centre of Alphabet’s growth
According to Forbes, Alphabet’s stock has risen 65 percent in 2025 alone, its biggest single-year jump since 2009, when shares surged nearly 93 percent. The rally has been largely driven by Google’s aggressive push into artificial intelligence. Last year, the company released multiple Gemini models, with the latest version, Gemini 3, debuting in November. In 2025, Google also unveiled Ironwood, the seventh generation of its AI chips, as competition with Nvidia intensifies.
How rich is he now?
The Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimates his wealth at around $267 billion as of mid-January 2026. The index also places him as the world’s third-richest person, with most of his wealth coming from his stake in Alphabet Inc. Recent reports also note that Brin has been gifting large amounts of Alphabet stock to charity, including about $700 million in May 2025 and $1.1 billion in November 2025.
At the same time, he is reportedly scaling back his presence in California. According to documents reviewed by The New York Times, an entity linked to Brin has shut down or relocated 15 California-based limited liability companies tied to his business interests.
Several of these entities were converted into Nevada companies shortly before Christmas. This is because of the initiative proposing a one-time 5 percent wealth tax on residents worth more than $1 billion, applied retroactively to those living in the state as of January 1.
Google was founded in 1998 by Page and Brin, then PhD candidates at Stanford University. Starting from a dorm room and later a friend’s garage in Menlo Park, California, the duo built a search engine that ranked web pages based on links, an idea that became the backbone of Google’s PageRank algorithm. Today, Alphabet owns products such as Gmail, Android and YouTube, and reported revenue of about $350 billion in 2024