Billionaires play a huge role in shaping the global economy, politics, and philanthropy. Forbes puts the number of billionaires in the world in 2022 at 2,668. Many of these billionaires were founders of giant technology companies, and much of their wealth is still invested in the companies they founded.
However, by borrowing against these assets, you can avoid selling your stock while deferring (or waiving to your heirs) taxes on unrealized capital gains. Billionaires can also take advantage of various tax credits to offset their reported income, so some on this list have not had to pay income tax in recent years. Since much of their wealth is in public stocks, the net worth of the richest can fluctuate depending on market valuations.
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Top 10 world richest person list
Below are the top 10 world richest person list in the world as of the same date, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. All figures are till the 5th of September, 2022 unless otherwise noted.
1. Elon Musk (The richest man in the world)
| Elon Musk | |
| Age | 51 |
| Residence | Texas |
| Co-Founder & CEO | Tesla |
| Net Worth | $241 Billion |
| Tesla Ownership Stake | 15% ($108 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Space Exploration Technologies ($46.9 Billion Pvt Asset) The Boring Company ($3.33 Billion Pvt Asset) Twitter ($3 Billion Public Asset) |
In 2020, Tesla stock surged 740%, boosting Musk’s wealth rankings. Tesla joined the S&P 500 in Dec 2020 & became the largest company added. Elon Musk became the richest person in the world in January 2021 and he has held this title ever since.
In April 2022, Musk launched a campaign to privatize his Twitter, leading to a $44 billion acquisition. Musk planned to raise $21 billion from his own funds. Ahead of the deal announcement, Musk sold $8.5 billion worth of Tesla shares.
In July 2022, Musk decided to exit his Twitter acquisition. Twitter then filed a lawsuit against Musk to force the acquisition, but Musk sued the company.
2. Jeff Bezos
| Jeff Bezos | |
| Age | 58 |
| Residence | Washington |
| Founder & Executive Chair | Amazon |
| Net Worth | $151 Billion |
| Amazon Ownership Stake | 10% ($127 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Blue Origin ($9.15 Billion Pvt Asset) The Washington Post ($250 Million Pvt Asset) |
Bezos took Amazon public in 1997, becoming the first company since Bill Gates in 1999 to surpass $100 billion in net worth. Bezos’ other projects include the aerospace company Blue Origin, The Washington Post (which he purchased in 2013), and the 10,000 Year Clock (aka Long Now).
Bezos owned up to 16% of Amazon in 2019 but gave up 4% of it to his ex-wife Mackenzie Scott as part of his divorce proceedings. In 2020, his stock on Amazon rose 76% as demand for his online shopping increased amid the COVID-19 pandemic. On July 5, 2021, Bezos stepped down as the CEO of his e-commerce giant and took over as chairman.
3. Gautam Adani
| Gautam Adani | |
| Age | 60 |
| Residence | Gurgaon, India |
| Founder & Chair | Adani Group |
| Net Worth | $141 Billion |
| Adani Enterprises, Power, and Transmissions Ownership Stakes | 75% each ($81.4 Billion) |
| Other Assets | 65% of Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone ($12.9 Billion Public Asset), 61% of Adani Green Energy ($27.6 Billion Public Asset), 37% of Adani Total Gas ($18.2 Billion Public Asset) |
Adani Group founder Gautam Adani surpassed Mukesh Ambani to become Asia’s richest person in March 2022. Adani manages six major Indian companies through Adani Group shares, including Adani Enterprises, Adani Power, Adani Transmissions with 75% stake, Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone with 65% stake, and Adani Green with 61% stake. He owns major shares of Energy and a 37% stake in Adani Total Gas.
As of September 6, 2022, the Adani Group of Companies has a market capitalization of US$238.4 billion. In 2009, Adani has entered the power generation market with Adani Power. Adani founded Adani Enterprises in 1988 to import and export goods. In 1994, his company received a permit to build a port facility at Mundra Port, now India’s largest privately owned port.
4. Bernard Arnault
| Bernard Arnault | |
| Age | 73 |
| Residence | Paris |
| CEO & Chair | LVMH |
| Net Worth | $132 Billion |
| Christian Dior Ownership Stake | 97.5% ($107 Billion Total) |
| Other Assets | Moelis & Company equity ($19.8 billion public asset), Hermès equity (undisclosed stake) |
Born in France, Bernard Arnault is Chairman and CEO of LVMH, the world’s largest luxury goods company. LVMH owns brands such as Louis Vuitton, Hennessy, Marc Jacobs, and Sephora.
Most of Arnault’s fortune comes from his huge stake in Christian Dior SE, the holding company that controls his 41.2% of LVMH. His stake in Christian Dior SE and his additional 6.2% stake in LVMH are held through his family-owned holding company Groupe Familial Arnault.
5. Bill Gates
| Bill Gates | |
| Age | 66 |
| Residence | Washington |
| Co-Founder | Microsoft |
| Net Worth | $114 Billion |
| Microsoft Ownership Stake | 1.3% (worth $26.4 billion) |
| Other Assets | Cascade Investment LLC (worth $51.7 billion public assets) |
While at Harvard University in 1975, Bill Gates worked with his childhood friend Paul Allen to develop new software for the original microcomputer. Following the success of this project, Gates dropped out of Harvard in his junior year and founded Microsoft with Allen.
Microsoft, the world’s largest software company, manufactures a line of personal computers, publishes books through Microsoft Press, provides e-mail service through Exchange servers, and sells video game systems and related peripherals. Gates, who was originally the chief architect of his software at Microsoft, transitioned to his CEO role in 2008. Later on, he joined Berkshire Hathaway’s board of directors in 2004. Both directors resigned on March 13, 2020.
Bill Gates has invested the majority of his net worth in his Cascade Investment LLC. Cascade is a Pvt investment company with various stakes in Canadian National Railways (CNR), Deere (DE), and Republic Services (RSG), as well as Pvt investments in real estate and energy.
6. Larry Page
| Larry Page | |
| Age | 49 |
| Residence | California |
| Co-Founder & Board Member | Alphabet (GOOG) |
| Net Worth | $98.7 Billion |
| Alphabet Ownership Stake | 6% ($88.4 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Approx $14 billion in cash |
Like several tech billionaires on this list, Larry Page began his journey to fame and fortune in a college dorm. While attending Stanford University in 1995, Page and his friend Sergey Brin came up with the idea of improving data extraction from the Internet. The duo has developed a new search engine technology called backrub, named for its ability to analyze backlinks. From there, Page and Brin founded Google in 1998, with Page until 2001, and from 2011 until 2019 he was CEO of the company. Later on, Sundar Pichai became the CEO of Google.
Google is the leading Internet search engine, accounting for over 92% of global searches. In 2006, the company acquired YouTube, a leading platform for user-submitted videos. After acquiring Android in 2005, Google released its Android operating system for mobile phones in 2008. Google was reorganized in 2015 and became a subsidiary of the holding company, Alphabet.
7. Warren Buffett
| Warren Buffett | |
| Age | 92 |
| Residence | Nebraska |
| CEO | Berkshire Hathaway |
| Net Worth | $102 Billion |
| Berkshire Hathaway Ownership Stake | 16% ($95.7 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Approx $1 billion in cash |
Buffett, popularly known as the Oracle of Omaha, is a buy-and-hold investor who has made his fortune by acquiring undervalued companies. Most recently, Berkshire Hathaway invested in large, well-known companies. The wholly-owned portfolio includes interests in insurance, power distribution and rail, and consumer goods. Buffett is known as a bitcoin skeptic.
Buffett has spent much of his fortune on charity. Between 2006 and 2020, he gave away $41 billion. Most of them are the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and his children’s charities. Buffett co-founded the Giving Pledge with Bill Gates in 2010. The 92-year-old Buffett, who still serves as CEO, has hinted that his successor could be Gregory Abel in 2021. Abel is the head of Berkshire’s non-insurance business.
8. Sergey Brin
| Sergey Brin | |
| Age | 49 |
| Residence | California |
| Co-Founder & Board Member | Alphabet (GOOG) |
| Net Worth | $94.4 Billion |
| Alphabet Ownership Stake | 6% ($80 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Approx $14 billion in cash |
Sergey Brin was born in Moscow, Russia, and immigrated to the United States with his family in 1979 when he was six years old. After he co-founded Google with Larry Page in 1998, when Eric Schmidt became his CEO in 2001, Brin became Google’s technology president. He held the same post at Alphabet holding company after its formation in 2015, and he resigned in 2019 when Sundar Pichai took over and became CEO of Google.
9. Larry Ellison
| Larry Elison | |
| Age | 78 |
| Residence | Hawaii |
| Co-Founder, Chair, and CTO | Oracle |
| Net Worth | $92.7 Billion |
| Oracle Ownership Stake | 40%+ ($62.8 Billion) |
| Other Assets | Tesla Equity ($12.2 Billion Public Asset), Approx $17 Billion in cash, and real asset |
In 1977, Ellison co-founded a software development lab with Oates and Miner. Two years after that, the company released his Oracle. It was the first commercial relational database program to use the Structured Query Language (SQL 80). The database program was so popular that in 1982 he changed the name of SDL to Oracle Systems Corporation. Ellison said he resigned in 2014 after he served as CEO of Oracle for 37 years. He joined Tesla’s board of directors in his December 2018.
Oracle is the world’s second-largest software company, offering a range of cloud computing programs, Java and Linux code, and the Oracle Exadata computing platform.
10. Steve Ballmer
| Steve Ballmer | |
| Age | 66 |
| Residence | Washington |
| Owner | Los Angeles Clippers |
| Net Worth | $90.7 Billion |
| Microsoft Ownership Stake | 4% ($81.7 Billion |
| Other Assets | Los Angeles Clippers ($3.16 Billion Pvt Asset, Approx $6 billion in cash |
Steve Ballmer joined Microsoft in 1980 after Bill Gates persuaded him to drop out of Stanford’s MBA program. He was the 30th employee at Microsoft. Ballmer became CEO of Microsoft by replacing Gates in 2000. He held this position until he retired in 2014. Ballmer said in 2011 he oversaw Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype for $8.5 billion. Ballmer lived on the same floor as Bill Gates while they attended Harvard University. The relationship between the two brothers became strained during Ballmer’s tenure as CEO when he began pushing tech companies into hardware such as Surface tablets and Windows Phones.
Summary
If you want to move a little closer to the list of richest billionaires, you may need to become a tech innovator or luxury retail thought leader. Or you can keep it simple and focus on value investing. increase. It’s not bad to be born rich. However, the greatest treasures on this list started out as brilliant ideas that people with creativity, drive, and connections used to build some of the world’s biggest companies.
FAQs: Frequently Asked Questions
Which country has the most billionaires?
The U.S. continued to have the most billionaires in the world, with a record of 609, while China dropped to 324
Total billionaire in the world?
according to the Forbes 2021 survey, there are 2668 billionaires in the world, and the total wealth is $13.1 trillion.
Who is the youngest female billionaire on the Forbes list?
For three straight years, Alexandra Andresen was the youngest billionaire on Forbes’ list of the world’s richest people until Kylie Jenner overtook Alexandra Andresen in 2019 as the youngest billionaire on the Forbes list
What are real-time billionaires?
Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaires rankings track the daily ups and downs of the world’s richest people. The wealth tracking platform provides continuous updates on the net worth and ranking of everyone confirmed as a millionaire by Forbes.
