The rich continue to get richer, according to the Forbes billionaires list, with the total wealth of the planet’s super-rich growing $2 trillion last year.
There were 141 new names added to the list to take the total to 2,781 in all, a new record surpassing the 2,755 set in 2021.
Nvidia founder Jensen Huang joined the ranks of the 20 richest people in the world, with his personal wealth calculated at $77 billion after his company’s shares soared over 220% higher over the past year.
But probably the most famous of the newcomers was Taylor Swift, who was powered onto the list by her record-breaking Eras tour, also making her the first musician to become a billionaire solely based on the wealth generated from songs and performances.
The pop star is estimated to now have a $1.1 billion fortune, based on tour earnings, the value of her music catalogue and real estate.
LVMH boss Bernard Arnault remained top of the list, with his $233 billion wealth edging further ahead of second-placed Elon Musk, although the Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder saw his net worth bounce back to $195 billion from $180 billion a year ago despite Tesla’s share falling over 10%.
Forbes noted that two thirds of the list has gotten richer in the past year, with 10 of the fat cats accounting for $507 billion of annual gains, more than half of which are from the tech billionaire founders club, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Oracle’s Larry Ellison, Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer and Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
The presence of Berkshire Hathaway investment guru Warren Buffet and Indian industrialist Mukesh Ambani in the top 10 show that other industries still hold some sway.
Zuckerberg enjoyed the largest mushrooming in personal wealth over the past 12 months, with his net worth growing $112.6 billion to $177 billion as Meta’s shares bounced back from around seven-year lows in late 2022 and nearly tripled in value over the 12 months.
The youngest new billionaire is 19-year-old Livia Voigt, an heiress of the cofounders of Brazilian turbine manufacturing giant WEG, along with her elder sister.
Excitement around AI was a driver for the creation of other new billionaires as well increasing the wealth of Nvidia’s Huang.
Semiconductor maker Advanced Micro Devices boss Lisa Su joined the list after a 120% rise in the share price, with a similar story for the husband and wife cofounders of Super Micro Computer, which rocketed more than tenfold to propel Charles Liang and Sara Liu to billionaire status.
Luke Hildyard, executive director for the High Pay Centre, said the publishing of the list highlighted a more urgent mission of spread wealth more evenly, proportionately and efficiently.
"The billionaire list is essentially an annual calculation of how much of the wealth created by the global economy is captured by a tiny caste of oligarchs rather than being used to benefit humanity as a whole,” he said.
“It should be the most urgent mission of the coming decades to spread this wealth more evenly, proportionately and efficiently."