CNN, Washington, D.C. As Donald Trump took the oath of office as U.S. President, it was difficult to overlook the similarities between the crowds at a U.S. presidential inauguration and the annual assembly of the world's wealthiest people in Davos, Switzerland, which began on Monday.

The wealthiest people in the world were there at Trump's inauguration in Washington on Monday, as well as the glitzy parties held to celebrate with the new president.

The three richest men in the world, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg, the CEOs of Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), and Meta (NASDAQ:META), were among those seated prominently. According to Forbes, their total net worth is close to $900 billion.

The arrival of the richest person in the world is seen by some as the pinnacle of Trump's comeback to power in Washington following his unsuccessful attempt to reverse the 2020 election results, which he lost to Joseph Biden.

Others see it as a warning that the most powerful people will be given preference in the upcoming years by the new administration in terms of trade, labor, taxes, and other policies. In his farewell speech, former President Joseph Biden warned that democracy in the US is in peril due to an expanding oligarchy.

In front of Trump's Cabinet nominations, the tech CEOs were seated favorably at the inaugural, according to U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat.

Perhaps the most well-positioned is Musk, who invested more than $250 million in Trump's reelection campaign after he had previously suggested that he retire in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.


With Trump in office, the CEO of Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) has been appointed to head a new panel to identify ways to reduce government spending, is anticipated to push for quicker regulatory approval for self-driving cars, and raises concerns about the future of federal investigations into him and his businesses.

According to Darrell West, a senior scholar at the Brookings Institution, "some of the business people who have been cozying up to Trump represent companies that get a lot of government contracts or are worried about government regulation."

After Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in November, many CEOs, including Zuckerberg, immediately allied themselves with Trump.


Meta declared that factchecking on its U.S. platform would be suspended. At Monday's special inauguration dinner, which was also attended by Bezos and Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Zuckerberg sat next to Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The CEO of Meta also held a pre-inaugural ball with other billionaire Republican supporters.

Several other Forbes list members were also in Washington, including Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) CEO Sundar Pichai, who spoke with Trump at the luncheon, LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault and several family members, who are the fifth-richest people in the world, and India's richest man, Mukesh Ambani.

In the hectic days leading up to Trump's inauguration, the relationship between corporate interests and U.S. policy was demonstrated for the well-known social media app TikTok.


Due to national security concerns, U.S. lawmakers overwhelmingly approved a ban on the app in 2024. However, Trump put the bill on hold by unexpectedly inviting TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew to the inauguration.

While some media outlets have claimed that Beijing has considered having Musk somehow take control of TikTok, Trump has suggested that the U.S. government could purchase a portion of the app.

David Kass, executive director of Americans for Tax Fairness, stated, "On his first day in office, you certainly see the obvious and overt involvement of the richest people in the world."