PayPal Credits Man $92 Quadrillion, Becomes World’s Richest Person

PayPal, in what is perhaps the largest accounting error in history, accidentally credited a Pennsylvania man with more than he was expecting. No, his account wasn’t off by a few dollars, not even a few hundred. Instead, after logging in Friday, the man found that his account balance was at a shocking $92,233,720,368,547,800.

Apparently someone over at PayPal was feeling extra generous toward Chris Reynolds. At least, that’s what one might think, after seeing an incredible $92 quadrillion (yes, that’s a real number — it’s $92,000 trillion) appear in their account unexpectedly.

The Pennsylvania man, Chris Reynolds, typically makes about $100 a month in transactions, trading and selling vintage car parts online.

After doing a double take, Reynolds decided to log out and check his PayPal account later. Sadly, the $92 quadrillion was gone and the balance was back to normal, sources at CNN say.

But, for a few moments at least, Reynolds was the world’s richest man, by a huge margin. That beats out the world’s previously most wealthy man, Carlos Slim, who has a fortune valued at over $73 billion. More than that, according to Gizmodo, Reynolds temporarily held more than 1300 times all the world’s money.

Maybe he could have found a nice solar system to buy (tropical islands — so middle class).

Actually, when asked what he would have done had he been able to keep all that dough, Reynolds offered a more practical suggestion. Reynolds says that with the vast fortune he “probably would have paid down the national debt.”

After correcting the error in the man’s account, PayPal contacted Reynolds and offered to make a donation of an unspecified amount to a charity of his choice as apology.

[Image via CNN / PayPal / Chris Reynolds]