Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is now worth $150 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaire index.
Jeff Bezos's net worth has increased by over $60 billion in the last 12 months, which makes him the world's richest man.
This places his worth higher than that of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, who has previously topped the rich lists - even at his peak in 1999.
Then Mr Gates was worth $100 billion - which would be around $149 billion today, when adjusted for inflation.
Mr Gates is currently in second place with a worth of $95 billion, having given away 700 million Microsoft shares and $2.9 billion in cash since 1996.
Mr Bezos says he is selling about $1.0 billion of Amazon stock every year to fund Blue Origin, the project he has founded to develop commercial space travel.
It's not the first time Jeff Bezos has topped the world's rich list - in July 2017, he briefly overtook Bill Gates to become the world's richest man according to Forbes when Amazon's shares surged - but returned to second place when their value dropped again.
The news of Mr Bezos's wealth came as Amazon prepared for its enormous Prime Day sale on 16 July, which was marred in Europe by worker strikes in Germany, Spain and Poland over working conditions.
"The message is clear - while the online giant gets rich, it is saving money on the health of its workers," said Stefanie Nutzenberger of Germany's Verdi services union.
Amazon said its workers were paid fairly, with permanent staff earning €12.22 an hour or more after two years.
Meanwhile two of Amazon's rivals, Microsoft and Walmart, are set to announce a five-year deal which will see the retailer use the tech giant's cloud computing technology, according to the Wall Street Journal.
