World's Richest Man Now Top NYT Shareholder

Mexican telecommunications billionaire Carlos Slim is having quite a week—he has become the biggest shareholder in the New York Times and reclaimed his title as the world's richest man. Slim has exercised warrants obtained when he loaned the company $250 million in 2009 to double his stake in the Times to 16.8% and become the leading holder of its publicly traded shares, reports Reuters, which notes that Slim follows other billionaires like Amazon's Jeff Bezos into the newspaper business.

Slim was knocked off his "world's richest" perch by Bill Gates in 2013, but he overtook him again earlier this week as a rise in the value of phone company America Movil pushed his net worth to $79.6 billion, compared to an estimated $79.1 billion for Gates, Forbes reports. The company accounts for most of Slim's wealth and it helped his fortune increase by $5.1 billion in just 12 business days in early July. (Slim is 74 years old and believes that most people should work into their 70s, but work only three days a week.)