Who wants to be a billionaire?

Last year was a boom year for the global billionaire community. The new Forbes magazine list of the richest people on earth contains a staggering 793 individual US-dollar billionaires, a 35 per cent jump from last year’s 587 individuals, and 66 per cent higher than the 476 of three years ago. While it is not possible to know whether the additional names are new billionaires, or simply existing ones that have just been discovered, it is clear that there is a now firmly established cadre of global financial elite. Altogether, individuals on this year’s list have a net worth of $2,600bn (e2,110bn), up 18 per cent over 2004, with an average net worth of $3.3bn. There are some things that do not seem to change. Bill Gates is in his 12th year as the richest man on the planet. And this year again, the runner-up is another American, Warren Buffet, who is a walking advertisement for his Berkshire Hathaway investment company. Overall, American residents dominate the list with 45 per cent of the individual entries for 2005. The next four countries with the most billionaires should come as no surprise either, although an endless stream of poor economic news from Germany may have led many to lose sight of the enormous levels of wealth in that country. More interesting are the names of some of the other countries that pop up in the top 20. These reflect the booming economies of the other ‘BRIC’ nations, in addition to Russia, which are creating vast amounts of new wealth at a rate not seen since the economic boom in the US in the early 20th century. However, one name that is not totally expected is Turkey, but this country is becoming the worst-kept economic success secret and attracting a great deal of foreign interest, particularly in its financial services sector.

These countries will undoubtedly continue their ascent through the ranks of billionaire nations. Figure one shows the 10 nations that experienced the fastest growth during 2005 in their proportion of the global total number of billionaires. The presence of Monaco and Switzerland underlines their own attraction as havens for the ultra-wealthy. However, if these are stripped out, the biggest gains were in China, Turkey, Brazil and India. The dramatic growth in the number of billionaires across the world is emblematic of the bigger wealth creation picture. Indeed, they reflect just the tip of an ultra high-net-worth iceberg. Their geographical distribution also helps to confirm the expectation that it is the emerging markets that will turbo-charge the growth of the global wealth management industry over the coming years. Ted Wilson is a consultant at wealth management strategy think tank Scorpio Partnership