Tesla Is Now Worth Half A Trillion Dollars

SURGING Tesla shares have pushed the company’s market capitalization to more than $515 billion, a fivefold increase since the start of the year.

The traditionally volatile stock has continued to experience price swings. But since reaching a low for the year in March, Tesla’s share price has been on an upward trajectory that accelerated in August.

Tesla’s share price, which rose 4.6% in morning trading to $545.62, has helped blast its CEO Elon Musk into the upper stratosphere of Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index. As of Tuesday, Musk’s net worth had risen $7.24 billion to more than $128 billion. Only Amazon’s Jeff Bezos stands in his way to becoming the world’s wealthiest person.

Tesla shares have been fueled over the past week by news that it will be added to the S&P 500 index in December. Since Friday, the company has added more than $52 billion to its market cap — the