Did you know that there are 12 million millionaires in the world, but only 2,325 billionaires. Here are some interesting facts about this most exclusive club:
- For every three million people on earth there’s a single billionaire.
- If there is an average billionaire, he or she is worth around $3 billion.
- 60% of billionaires made their wealth themselves. Meanwhile, 26.9% became billionaires from re-investing inherited wealth. 13% of them inherited their billionaire status straight out.
- Your average billionaire is 63 years old, and 93% of the world’s billionaire population is over 45.
- Billionaires are into matrimony as 65% of them are married.
- While billionaires went to over 700 different universities, the Ivy League schools have the most grads: 25 went to the University of Pennsylvania, 22 went to Harvard, and 20 went to Yale.
- A surprising number of billionaires don’t have a college degree. 35% never finished undergrad.
- Billionaires tend to work in finance. Almost 20% of billionaires made their careers on Wall Street or its equivalents.
- Europe has more billionaires (775) than any other global region.
- The US has more billionaires (571) than any other country (and 57 newly minted members since last year).
- Billionaires have a combined wealth of $7.3 trillion, a 12% increase from last year. That’s higher than the market capitalization of all the Dow Jones companies put together.
- If all the world’s billionaires decided to join forces and become a country, their combined wealth would be greater than the GDP than Japan.
- The 2,325 billionaires control 4% of the wealth in the world. (Point of fact: the event more inclusive 1% of the world’s population controls 40% of the wealth.)
- Billionaires invest a lot in real estate, at about $160 million per person. They tend to have four properties.
- Billionaires tend to have “non-real estate luxury assets.” For example, one in 30 billionaires owns a sports team or a racehorse. Other significant luxury assets include yachts, planes, cars, and art.
These facts are found in research firm Wealth-X’s new Billionaire Census, as reported in the Financial Post. Read the full FP article is here.