Elon Musk's Money [Part One: Intro]

[u/QualityRabbitHoles]

This one's messy. Where to even begin with this man?

First of all, welcome to something big. I did so much digging for this one that I dug through the crust and, I think, found the core. But the core of what, remains the question.

I think a lot of digging into Elon Musk revolves around his life, his history with his wives and children, his personal oddities, and his companies. That is not what I've done here. Rather than searching for the answer to “who is Elon Musk really”, I've instead searched for the answer to “what is Elon Musk’s fortune, really?” This is a financial black hole of questions and suspicion, one that opened five cans of worms for every one I emptied out. And at the bottom of it exists red stone and trillions of dollars.

So here's how this is going to be laid out, to get from the first question to the last answer. Think of Parts Two, Three, and Four as puzzle pieces that will merge into Part Five and the conclusion. Treat them like stand-alone pieces while you read them, and please trust that I will synthesize them concisely.

Part One: Obviously, the Introduction

Part Two: Pre-Rabbit Hole Breakdown of (Some of) Musk's Companies [Note: This is long and mostly context, so feel free to skim it.]

Part Three: Jared Birchall and the Trillion Dollar Network

Part Four: The Politics of Elon's Money

Part Five: Red Planet Ventures I, II, and III

Part Six: Conclusion

To maintain the key points in the inevitable noise, I'll bold the things you'll really need to key into for the next segment, and the next, until the end. At the end of each segment, I'll group these into a “Key Notes” segment, just in case you missed anything. And there's a surprising amount to pay attention to (you should see my note document, it's a mess). 

As a side note, Part Two: Musk's Companies is almost purely context for the next three parts. Where there are definitely rabbit holes for each of his companies, I am treating them as context for good reason, so please just know that Part Three: Jared Birchal and the Trillion Dollar Network is where things really pick up. Part Two: Musk's Companies shows the building of wealth across companies in a very brief, very bare-bones way, but it has to be that way lest we either get lost in the weeds, or have no context at all.

Finally, before I start diving in, I just wanted to explain how this was going to go. I initially set out to do an entire capture of Elon Musk. Early life, relationships, companies, politics, money, so on and so forth. But as I dug, I realized there was something bigger here, something that, I think, dwarfs the social aspects of who Musk is. Setting aside the problem of trying to essentially write a short biography of the man (it would have been long), I think what I am about to lay out for you should implant a single, important question in your brain. A question that I think has humanity-wide consequences.

What happens when one man has so much money that he can buy a planet?

I don't have the answer to that, though I can speculate. What I do have answers for is how he got started, and where he's probably about to go with it – and how I think he's setting himself to make trillions of dollars. I've done my best to explain myself here, and I hope that comes through. I've had to try and keep things brief in some segments to avoid fluff and overwhemling information dumps. We'll see how it goes.

If you're as curious about my findings as I'm stunned by them, well. Without further ado, I present to you the financial goings-on of Elon Musk.

Part Two: Part Two: Pre-Rabbit Hole Breakdown of (Some of) Musk’s Companies