NEW YORK: Spain’s Amancio Ortega, the co-founder of the Inditex fashion group, leapt over Warren Buffett and France’s Bernard Arnault to become the world’s third richest person on Forbes’ 2013 annual ranking of billionaires, with an estimated net worth of $57bn.
Mexico’s Carlos Slim remained the richest person with a fortune of $73bn, and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates held on to the No. 2 spot with a net worth of $67bn.
Ortega’s fortune increased $19.5bn, the biggest gain for any of the billionaires, from the report in 2012. He jumped two places and bumped Buffett, Chairman and Chief Executive of conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway Inc with a fortune of $53.5bn, out of the top three to the No. 4 spot for the first time since 2000. Arnault, of the LVMH luxury goods group, dropped to 10th place with $29bn.
Oracle Corp’s Larry Ellison, with a fortune of $43bn, rounded out the top five in the ranking that included a record 1,426 billionaires, with an average net worth of $3.8bn. Forbes’ 27th annual ranking is the biggest ever and has the largest jump in total number of people added in one year.
The total net worth of the world’s billionaires is $5.4 trillion, according to Forbes, up from $4.6 trillion in the previous ranking. The United States led the list with 442 billionaires, followed by 386 from Asia and the Pacific region, with 122 in China alone.
reuters
