The New Forbes 400 Club - First time ever that No-one had under one billion
September 21, 2007 - The Forbes new 400 Club list of America’s wealthiest is out and it wasn’t enough just to own a billion - this year it took $1.3 billion. The top 400 tycoons on the list have a collective net worth of $1.54 trillion, up $290 million from last year. It was also the first time ever that only billionaires made the list.
Some of the list:
- Numero Uno: For the 14th straight year - Microsoft’s Bill Gates with wealth of $59 billion;
- No. 2: Top second - Investment guru Warren Buffett with $52 billion.
- No. 5: Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page with $18.5 billion each (FIRST-TIMERS);
- No. 7: Kirk Kerkorian vaulted to seventh place with $18 billion as shares of his MGM Mirage casino surged - Kirk got the biggest jump in the group;
- No. 9: Oil and commodity kingpin brothers Charles and David Koch with $17 billion each (FIRST-TIMERS)
- No. 18: Corporate raider Carl Icahn
- No. 25: New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg with $11.5 billion
- No. 165: Tie with Pete Peterson of the Blackstone Group and the Carlyle Group’s David Rubenstein
- No. 380: Yankees owner George Steinbrenner - $1.3 billion.
Wall Street tycoons were among the biggest gainers and almost half of the 45 new additions to the list made their millions in hedge funds and private equity.
Fifty people dropped off the list including:
- Starbucks founder Howard Schultz,
- Home Depot founder Ken Langone
- Campbell Soup heir Dorrance Hill Hamilton, who had made every Forbes 400 list since it started in 1982.
Once again, the biggest gainer on the list is casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, with a net worth up $9 billion. Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands stock is up 125 percent since its public offering in December 2004. Adelson has made almost $1 million an hour since the 2004 Forbes 400 was published.
Surging real estate, oil and other asset prices paved the way for 28 new members. Developer John P. Manning used political savvy to build a $1.1 billion fortune, in part by brokering low-income housing projects.
Chesapeake Energy founders Aubrey McClendon and Tom L. Ward are two of the oil fortunes added to the list. Manny Mashouf placed his skimpy women’s wear on TV shows like “Party of Five” and “Ally McBeal”; today he has a $1.5 billion fortune in Bebe clothing stores.
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