In a club of two, the only humans worth $100,000,000,000
IN the world of the super-wealthy, two men leave the rest standing. For the first time there are two ‘centibillionaires’ – Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos.
Their fortunes have topped $100billion (€87billion) each, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Mr Gates, 63, became a centibillionaire at the height of the dot-com bubble, and returned to the exclusive club yesterday after he added $9.6billion to his fortune in the past year.
Mr Bezos, 55, is the richest man alive, with $146billion to his name, having added almost $21billion to his wealth in the previous 12 months.
However, his position in the $100billion club may be short lived because he faces what may be the world’s most expensive divorce. It is likely to make his wife MacKenzie the world’s richest woman and, if he hands over part of his shareholding, threatens to weaken his position on the Amazon board. The figures are produced by the financial company Bloomberg, which takes the stock market and wider economic indicators into account.
The combined wealth of the richest 500 people has gone up $509billion to $3.5trillion, eclipsing many countries’ gross domestic product.
There were two Irish citizens in the top 500 yesterday: construction tycoon Pallonji Mistry is at number 37 with $21.8billion, while financier John P Grayken comes in at 276 with $5.92billion.