Meet the world’s 24 superbillionaires; Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos top rich list

Elon Musk sits at the top of the superbillionaires list. (Image: Getty)

Sat, 01 Mar 2025

By Katherine ClarkeIn 1987, Forbes published its first billionaires list, featuring 140 individuals whose combined wealth totalled US$295 billion (NZ$522.5b). At the time, the richest person in the world was Japan’s Yoshiaki Tsutsumi, a real estate tycoon worth US$20b. Today, the world’s richest person, Elon Musk, is worth US$419.4b, roughly 21 times as much as Tsutsumi at his peak and more than two million times as much as the median net worth of an American household, according to exclusive data from global wealth intell...

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