Invisible internet money is the new real money!
Forbes magazine’s latest list of the world’s 400 richest people came out yesterday and the results were fairly predictable — Carlos Slim at #1, with Bill Gates and then Warren Buffet following him as the richest Americans — with one shocking exception.
26-year-old Mark Zuckerberg, inventor of social networking website Facebook, is now richer than the CEOs of companies that actually make things. With a fortune of approximately $6.9 billion, based on the estimated worth of his ownership shares in Facebook, Zuckerberg is ahead of conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch ($6.3 billion) and gadget shiller Steve Jobs ($5.5 billion.) A year ago, Zuckerberg was only worth $2 billion dollars; you can thank all those hours your aunt spent on FarmVille for tripling his net worth.
Italian Prime Minister and hide-and-seek enthusiast Silvio Berlusconi ranks ahead of all three men with $9 billion, but was not the richest politician on Forbes‘ list. That honor goes instead to New York’s term-limit-opposing mayor, Michael Bloomberg, who with a net work of approximately $18 billion dollars is the 23rd richest man in the world.
Fox News target/part-owner Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud is 19th, with $19.4 billion.
In contrast to last year’s list, which wrung its hands over the fact that many of the world’s richest had gotten slightly poorer, this year the rich got richer: 217 of the 400 were worth more than they were in 2009 and only 17 were worth less. (via The Daily Mail)