Jeff Bezos sets new record, loses $29b in two days

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos has lost more than US$19.2 billion ($29.3b) over the last two trading days. Photo / AP

The world's richest man Jeff Bezos is now a lot closer to the number two spot after suffering a record two-day loss.

The Amazon founder and CEO lost US$19.2 billion ($29.3b) over the last two trading days – a record previously held by Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, who lost US$16.5b in July, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Amazon shares closed down 6.3 per cent, or US$103.93, today (Monday in the US) and 7.8 per cent on Friday (in the US) for its biggest two-day decline since February 2014, when shares plummeted 14.1 per cent, according to CNBC.

The two-day drop in Amazon's share price left Bezos with a US$128.1b fortune, down from a peak of US$167.7b in early September.

The world's second richest man, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, now trails Bezos by US$35.2b.

Last week Amazon reported another record quarterly profit, fueled by the growth of online shopping and its cloud-computing service.

But its revenue grew less than Wall Street analysts expected, and Amazon's shares fell after the results were released.

Amazon posted third-quarter profit of US$2.88b, its fourth straight quarter of profits above US$1b. A year ago, it reported profit of just US$256 million. On a per-share basis, it reported earnings of US$5.75, beating the US$3.29 per share analyst expected, according to Zacks Investment Research.

Revenue rose 29 per cent to US$56.58b, but that was below the US$57.05b analysts expected.

- With AP