The richest people in the world became $ 1 trillion richer in 2017, which is more than four times their last year’s gain as their stock markets reached historic highs, Bloomberg reports.
The Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which tracks the daily wealth of the 500 richest people in the world, is up 23%.
Meanwhile, the MSCI World and S & P500 stock indices added almost 20% each.
By the end of the trading session on Tuesday, December 26, 500 billionaires controlled $ 5.3 trillion, compared with $ 4.4 trillion as of December 27, 2016.
Most of all this year, the fortune of the founder of Amazon.com Inc. Jeff Bezos. He became richer by $ 34.2 billion and in October was ahead of Microsoft Corp. Bill Gates, taking first place in the ranking of the richest people in the world.
Gates has been a leader in this ranking since May 2013. He donates a significant part of his fortune to charity. Including in August, he decided to transfer $ 4.6 billion to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
At the end of November, Bezos' net worth exceeded $ 100 billion. Now it is $ 99.6 billion, compared to Gates $ 91.3 billion, Bloomberg writes.
George Soros also gives up a significant part of his fortune. In October, it became known that his family office had transferred $ 18 billion to Open Society funds over the past few years.
As a result, the billionaire investor dropped to 195th place in the Bloomberg ranking with a fortune of $ 8 billion.
2017 was significant for technology-based billionaires: 57 people in the index became richer by $ 262 billion. Their fortune increased by 35% – more than that of billionaires representing any other sector.
The combined fortune of the 27 richest people in Russia grew by $ 29 billion to $ 275 billion.
The richest billionaire in Russia, according to Bloomberg, is the main shareholder of Severstal Alexei Mordashov. Since the beginning of the year, his fortune has increased by $ 2.53 billion to $ 19.5 billion.
According to UBS Group AG and PricewaterhouseCoopers, the number of Asian billionaires for the first time exceeded the number of American ones.
38 Chinese billionaires in the Bloomberg index in 2017 became richer by $ 177 billion.
65% growth was the highest among the 49 countries represented.
American billionaires still have the highest weight in the index.
159 people in the US this year have become richer by $ 315 billion, that is, by 18%. Now they control a total of $ 2 trillion.
