Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg now worth $18 billion

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's personal fortunes have soared, thanks to investment fund GSV Capital's recent stake in the social networking site which has put the Harvard dropout at a worth higher than Google founder Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

Earlier this week, GSV Capital Corp bought 225,000 shares in Facebook at an average price of $29.28 each.

This stake values the popular social networking site at about $70 billion.

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Based on the new investment, Zuckerberg in turn is worth approximately $18 billion, a report in Time magazine said.

"With the new valuation, Zuckerberg has one-upped Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, whose fortunes are estimated to have dropped," the Time report said.

This estimate makes Zuckerberg the third-richest man in the technology sector in the world, only behind Microsoft's Bill Gates and Oracle's Larry Ellison.

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While Gates is estimated to be currently worth $56 billion, Ellison is the world's fifth-richest billionaire at USD 39.5 billion.

Earlier this year, Zuckerberg's net worth stood at $13.5 billion.

He had already shot past Apple's Steve Jobs last year and has now passed Google's Brin and Page, whose fortunes are now estimated to have dropped to $17 billion from $19.8 billion in March.