Meet the billionaires of the world

As per Forbes, 141 billionaires were added in 2024 to take the total count to 2,781 billionaires in the world. The combined wealth of these billionaires stands at an evaluation of US$ 14.2 trillion, US$ 2 trillion more than in 2023. The United States of America once again emerged as the country with a record-breaking 813 billionaires worth US$ 5.7 trillion (compared to 735, worth US$ 4.5 trillion in 2023). China (including Hong Kong) secured the second spot with 473 billionaires worth US$ 1.7 trillion, followed by India at the third place with 200 billionaires worth US$ 954 billion.

In terms of cities, New York stands tall yet again with an estimated 110 billionaires worth US$694 billion. The American city is followed by Hong Kong (HKSAR) and Moscow (Russia) who are tied for the second spot with 74 billionaires each. The total net worth of Hong Kong is US$ 326 billion while that of Moscow is US$ 378 billion. Mumbai (India) is placed third with 69 billionaires and a net worth of US$ 379 billion.

Now that we have covered the countries and cities, one must be wondering who are the top 10 richest people in the world. Read along to know more about the 10 richest people in the world on the basis of their real-time net worth (as of December 05, 2024). If you are looking for a role model, look no further. Draw inspiration from these billionaires who have left their footprints all over the world.

1. Elon Musk, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 337.3 billion

Elon Reeve Musk is the co-founder and CEO of Tesla, Inc., the largest electric car maker in the world. He is also the founder, CEO, and CTO of SpaceX — a space exploration company that aims to make space travel cheaper and easier. The market value of SpaceX has quadrupled in the past few years. Some of the other ventures that Musk co-founded include PayPal, Neuralink, OpenAI, and Zip2, among others. Recently, he acquired Twitter for US$ 44 billion. Forbes estimates that the social media company, which he renamed X, is worth nearly 70% less as of August 2024. The 53-year-old owns an estimated 54% of xAI, which he founded in 2023. Private investors valued the company at a reported US$ 50 billion in November 2024.

2. Jeff Bezos, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 232.7 billion

Jeffrey Preston Bezos founded the multinational tech company Amazon.com, Inc. in 1994 out of his garage. From being an online bookstore to establishing itself as a force to reckon with in the e-commerce industry, digital streaming, and cloud computing, Amazon is considered one of the Big Five companies in the USA. Bezos has made several charitable contributions to preserve the climate in the past. Recently, he donated more than US$ 400 million 00worth of stock to non-profits. He also shared that he would give away the majority of his wealth in his lifetime. Along with The Washington Post, the 60-year-old also owns Blue Origin, an aerospace company developing rockets; he briefly flew to space in one in July 2021.

3. Larry Ellison, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 231.1 billion

Lawrence Joseph Ellison is the co-founder, chairman, and CTO of Oracle Corporation. Along with two partners Bob Miner and Ed Oates, he founded the company in 1977 and called it Software Development Laboratories (SDL). Two years later, the company was renamed Relational Software Inc., before it officially became Oracle Systems Corporation in 1983. It was named after Ellison’s initial database, ‘Oracle’ which he created for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Ellison sat on Tesla’s board from December 2018 to August 2022. The 80-year-old owned 45 million split-adjusted shares before stepping down as a director. Oracle has grown in part through steady acquisitions of software companies: the biggest was US$ 28.3 billion for electronic health records company Cerner in 2021.

4. Mark Zuckerberg, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 212.1 billion

The 40-year-old American businessman Mark Zuckerberg co-founded the social media service Facebook and its parent company Meta Platforms. Zuckerberg, along with his roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes, introduced Facebook in February 2004. By 2008, Zuckerberg became the world’s youngest self-made billionaire and in 2012, he made Facebook public. As of now, Zuckerberg owns about 13% of the company’s stock. In 2021, Facebook was renamed to Meta in order to shift the company’s focus to the metaverse. Interestingly, a movie was made on Zuckerberg and the founding years of Facebook, titled, The Social Network, starring Jesse Eisenberg as Zuckerberg.

5. Bernard Arnault and Family, France | real-time net worth – US$ 164.3 billion

Bernard Jean Étienne Arnault is the chairman and CEO of LVMH Moët Hennessy – Louis Vuitton SE (LVMH). The LVMH group is the world’s largest luxury goods company that houses brands such as Christian Dior, Louis Vuitton, Moët & Chandon, and Givenchy, among others. In January 2021, LVMH acquired American jeweller Tiffany & Co for US$ 15.8 billion which is believed to be the biggest luxury brand acquisition ever. All of Arnault’s five children work at LVMH. The 75-year-old’s holding company Agache backs venture capital firm Aglaé Ventures, which has investments in businesses such as Netflix and TikTok’s parent company ByteDance. In July 2022, he proposed a reorganisation of his holding company Agache to give his children equal stakes.

6. Warren Buffett, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 146 billion

Warren Edward Buffett, popularly known as the Oracle of Omaha, is the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway which is one of the largest holding companies in the world. Buffett developed an interest in business at a very young age and went on to become an investor when he was just 11 years-old. By the age of 13, he was paying his taxes. No wonder he is regarded as one of the most successful investors in the world. A philanthropist, he started The Giving Pledge initiative along with Bill Gates in 2009, where billionaires were encouraged to pledge half of their wealth towards humanitarian causes. So far, the 94-year-old has given more than US$ 49 billion, mostly to the Gates Foundation and his kids’ foundations.

7. Larry Page, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 144.7 billion

Lawrence Edward Page is the co-founder and board member of Google (one of the Big Five companies). He is also the co-creator and namesake of PageRank — an algorithm which ranks web pages in the search engine. Page has been CEO of Google from 1997 to 2001 and 2011-2015. After that, he became the CEO of Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, and held the post until 2019. Pursuing his passion, the 51-year-old has been an investor in several companies. One such company is a space exploration company, Planetary Resources, which is breaking ground in space exploration.

8. Sergey Brin, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 138.3 billion

Sergey Mikhaylovich Brin is the co-founder and board member of Google. Brin co-founded the tech company with Larry Page in 1998 while they were pursuing their PhD at Stanford University. They both are still working together at Google and are trying to solve Earth’s climate problems and find alternate sources of energy. Brin is an expert in data mining, which is an important base of the algorithm for their search engine. As per reports, the 51-year-old has reportedly put US$ 250 million into LTA Research, his high-tech airship project.

9. Amancio Ortega, Spain | real-time net worth – US$ 130.6 billion

Spanish businessman Amancio Ortega is touted as the pioneer in fast fashion. The 88-year-old is the founder and former chairman of Inditex fashion group, best known for its chains of Zara and Bershka clothing and accessories shops. Ortega owns about 60% of Madrid-listed Inditex, which has eight brands, including Massimo Dutti and Pull & Bear, and 5,000 stores around the world. The second wealthiest retailer in the world owns two yachts: “Drizzle” and “Valoria B”, as well as a Gulfstream G650 jet.

10. Steve Ballmer, USA | real-time net worth – US$ 127.9 billion

Steve Ballmer is the owner of the American professional basketball team Los Angeles Clippers. As per Forbes, the current evaluation of the team is US 4.65 billion. The 68-year-old American businessman and investor has previously served as CEO of Microsoft from 2000 to 2014. He is also the co-founder of Ballmer Group, a philanthropic investment company. In 2022, Ballmer and his wife Connie Snyder committed US$ 425 million to the University of Oregon for an institute to address the behavioural and mental health needs of children in the state. To date, the Ballmer family has given away more than US$ 4 billion through philanthropic deeds.