Meet the World’s richest man in the world, Amancio Ortega, a Spanish clothes magnate. Don’t get staggered. As we all know, Bill Gates is the World’s richest man in the world. Bill Gates briefly relinquished his title as the world’s richest man to a Spanish retail magnate Amancio Ortega on Friday morning. He has become a new richest man in the world surpassing the Microsoft founder, Bill Gates for the first time ever. A mysterious multi-billionaire founder of European clothing retailer Zara has smashed Bill Gates to hold the title of Wealthiest person on the planet, with a fortune of $79.8 billion (€71.83 billion or £51.84 billion).

Amancio Ortega is a Spanish clothier briefly dethroned Bill Gates with a net worth hit of nearly $80 billion as a stock in his parent company, Industria de Diseño Textil reached an all-time high of 33.99 Euros per share. Gates immediately reclaimed the top ranking after Ortega’s shares glided slightly to 33.80 Euros as of 10:52 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. As the shares of Inditex and Microsoft MSFT bounced up and down, the Spanish billionaire received the title. For a few hours on Friday morning, Ortega has become the richest man in the world overthrowing Bill Gates.

Ortega – World’s Richest Man for Few Hours

The elusive Ortega may not be as popular as Bill Gates, but he’s quietly mounted the wealth rankings in the recent years, as his Spanish company, Zara continues to develop and perform well. Distinct to many other  richest people in the world, Ortega has an interesting rags-to-riches story. He was born in 36 during the Spanish civil war and his father was a son of a railway worker who earned a meager salary of 300 pesetas a month. He was not born with a golden spoon, instead he spent his childhood with much struggle during which his family could not always afford enough food.

Absolute Bottom Rung to World’s Richest Man

Ortega’s biographer described his childhood memories as he left school in his early teens. He then started working his way up from the absolute bottom level as a courier boy in a shop. At the age of 40, Ortega got around to setting up Zara with his wife Rosalia Mera in the year 1975. They cofounded Zara, the fast-fashion retailer by selling bathrobes and lingerie and it has gone from strength to strength, initially grown in Spain and expanded to the neighboring Portugal and France, then London. Now, the company is all over the globe.

Ortega owns 59% of the company today. Industria de Diseño Textil or Inditex is the parent company of  Zara and other brands like Pull&Bear and Massimo Dutti. The company is the envy of the retail world with $20 billion sales and it always maintains its stores stocked with the latest trends. Over the last 24 hours, Ortega’s fortune increased by 5.3%, another $4 billion, which is partially down to a deluge in Inditex shares.

From the last 10 years, the market value of Inditex has increased by about 570%, which is the main reason of Ortega’s climb up the ranks. Amancio Ortega to thank Mario Draghi for his rank, the head of the European Central Bank for sending shares in the euro zone surging upwards.

It is a quite astonishing moment for the 79-year-old Spaniard to become World’s Wealthiest Man at least for few hours.