The World's First Trillionaire
Yahoo has an interesting article Who Will Be the Worlds First Trillionaire?
The article insists this can happen in the next 100 years:
services firm Credit Suisse, it could eventually become a reality for a select few worldwide. Not anyone you or I know, of course, but we’re on track to see our first trillionaire sometime in the next century.That's a "1" followed by 12 zeroes. It sounds like a goal that Austin Powers’ arch nemesis Dr. Evil would shoot for but, according to Swiss financial
Considering that the current "richest" person in the world isn't even worth 1/10 of a trillion dollars I find it hard to believe that someone will get there in the next 100 years. Considering that in the last 20 Years Bill Gates' (Currently Gates tops Forbes list) net worth has quadrupled, it seems far fetched that he can keep that pace of growth.
The article lists several other billionaires that could get there, but most of them are past middle age and Elon Musk is so far behind ($6 Billion) that even at 42 years old he isn't going to crack $1 trillion in his lifetime.
I don't see it happening in the next 100 Years, but I'd love some of you Monkeys to prove me wrong and tell me how it can be done...and who you think can do it.
How do other countries look at the millionaire/billionaire benchmark? Do they convert to USD? Like, a millionaire in China must be pretty common.
And while we're on the topic, why is a single Yen worth like 5 cents? Why don't they create a currency that equals 1,000 Yen or something? They'd save money on commas.
Is this a serious question? Incomes in China are much lower in terms of USD, and half a Yen can buy you a decent breakfast. A currency worth 1,000 Yen makes no sense when you wouldn't ever be able to spend 1,000 Yen in one go
Was going to downvote until I laughed out loud at the 'save money on commas' part
Yen is Japanese...
It will likely be someone in Russia or some other "developed" place that is shady in nature. When you consider that many of the oligarchs there are richer than Gates, however their wealth isn't always recognized by western countries due to how their wealth was created or other political reasons. It is said that some of them are worth north of 75 to 80 billion.
This. The Forbes 400 and lists like it miss the majority of wealth in the world I think.
Current estimates say Putin could be worth as much as $70 bn. Gaddafi was at his peak worth a rumored $200 bn. Not to mention the families like Rockefeller whose fortune in1937 was anywhere from $400-700 bn in today's dollars.
Link?
In 100 years, using the average long term inflation rate of 3.2%, $1 trillion would have the equivalent purchasing power of $42 billion today. Bloomberg lists 8 people who have greater than $42 B net worth so I'm a little surprised you think this is far-fetched.
The Rothschilds are likely trillionaires already but the media will never report that. In the 1800's their net worth was estimated at roughly $6 billion. Do the math. By now..
Less Jewish conspiracy theories would be better...
Less garbage ad hominem responses would be better.
Yeah, I think they had more money than entire France; correct me if I am wrong.
Not even close. If it were that easy to keep your wealth, there would be a lot of trillionaires out there. Are the Rockefellers worth $400 Billion now? No.
Inflation is the big killer, but there have more than enough wars, tax hikes, investments gone sour, charities to give to and stupid things to buy to keep anyone from staying at the very top for 150 years straight.
I read this article. Basically said someone would have to have a series of home run tech ventures (like Zuck starting Facebook, then 4 other equally successful ventures). The roadblocks are mainly boredom and charity. Like there gets to be a point when money has no value or additional utility.
IMO, we will eventually have trillionaires, but when that happens a trillion will not be worth what we think it is today.
Totally believable due to inflation. Remember when gas was $0.99 per gallon?
Wasn't Rockafeller a trillionaire in today's dollars?
In any case, I think we will definitely see trillionaire's in our lifetime. Like the industrial revolution, and digital revolution, there will be new fontiers that we don't think is possible today that will be lead to some very very rich individuals in the future.
Precisely. A major breakthrough in any of genomic medicine, bioengineering, artificial intelligence, robotics, or energy (akin to a major nuclear fusion development) could easily vault one lucky entrepreneur to the coveted trillionaire milestone. Honestly, I would be somewhat surprised if this didn't occur within my lifetime.
With the direction our society is heading today, by the time that happens, anything of that magnitude will be made property of the state in the name of the "greater good of society" and the money to be made of those proportions by individuals from their own intellectual property will be wasted away by the never ending stream of incompetence that we call our federal government.
In the article that I read about this it mentioned wealth being hidden in different countries, ala Rothschild. It also talked about generational wealth transfer because of low estate taxes.
Forbes' Real time Billionaires watch shows Gates at 77.2bn today. Let's assume he lives until he's 85 (27 more years). To break $1Tn, he'd need just under a 10% ror. If Gates wasn't actively focused on charity, that would be very doable. Someone like Zuckerberg or Sergey Brin seems like a layup to break $1Tn.
Charity and wealth taxation seems like the only thing standing in the way of this in the next 25 years imho.
I seriously doubt Microsoft stocks, of which most of Gates net worth consists of, will be able to deliver 10% year after year cumulative returns for the next 27 years. If anything it is more likely that further technological disruptions may cause them to decline/go out of business at some point. MS has already lost much of its dominance in the PC market as Mac grew and Ubuntu and other Linux distros/open source environments are eating their lunch in the corporate server market. Serious technology companies like Google don't use microsoft products as do many government institutions.
Gates owns less than 5% of MSFT which, at the last price of $40.24/sh x 337,991,164 shares = $13.6B. The rest of his wealth (oh just $66B) seems fairly diversified. The only thing holding back current billionaires is a combination of charity pledges and the estate tax.
Putin is already a trillioinaire.
I wouldn't be surprised if some old money families that "fly under the radar" are already there. If you compound anything at 6% for over a hundred years...
There is a new book called "Capital in the 21st Century" by Piketty. It received good reviews. From what I understand, the thesis is that family dynastic wealth is increasing extremely quickly, and in the not too distant future...the US will look like Downton Abbey. The old capital versus labor argument on steroids.
Satoshi Nakamoto, assuming he/she is one person.
Nominal value does not mean anything.
The title of the article should be: ''What will you be able to buy with a trillion dollar, a 100 years from now?''. The answer is: not a lot.
Hopefully though, by then, central banks will be something of the past, gold standard will be fully applied everywhere and we will have a couple of competing currencies (Bitcoin, Gold, Silver, etc.)
Dreaming is free, right?
Elon Musk
I am pretty sure that there have been at least 20 trillionaires throughout history. Present day trillionaire could be Putin, as well as those rich families mentioned above.
Hell, Rockefeller had, based on wiki, some 700 bn back in the day. That is at least 1 tn in my book. When you think of all those emperors, kings, early-day bankers, etc... plenty of trillionaires id say.
This is wrong he had just under 700 billion adjusted into year 2000 dollars.
"John D. Rockefeller
On September 29, 1916, John D. Rockefeller became the first person to ever reach a nominal personal fortune of US$1 billion. Rockefeller amassed his fortune from the Standard Oil company, of which he was a founder, chairman and major shareholder. By the time of his death in 1937, estimates place his net worth in the range of US$392 billion to US$663.4 billion in adjusted dollars for the late 2000s (decade), and it is estimated that his personal fortune was equal to 1.53% of the total U.S. annual GDP in his day. When considering the real value of his wealth, Rockefeller is widely held to be the wealthiest person in history."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_historical_figures
I remember the time when Gates was making a lot more than nowadays. At that point, it was forecasted that he would be a trillionaire in 2000s, but growth stopped. I am positive we will see a trillionaire soon, at least people, who are under 30 right now, will see that in their lifetime.
You can always be a trillionaire in Zimbabwe...
I mean a million today doesn't go as far as it did in the 50's and etc.
Substantial wealth creation takes a long time to build and maintain. I think after inflation adjustment, the ultra 0.1% percent isn't really that much richer than their predecessors before this century. (just a thought and am probably wrong on this)
Future inflation will make it more likely to happen
In 2008, there were numerous trillionaires in Zimbabwe. The problem was it was only due to hyperinflation...
My capabilities of becoming a trillionaire is great in theory, but not in reality. Case in point. (insert joke here)
I had to write a paper in middle school about the difference between theory and reality, and set about to ask my dad to explain the two. Dad told me to go ask my sister if she would sleep with the janitor at her high school for a trillion dollars. I did, and she said, "Of course I would for a trillion dollars!" I told my father the result, and he told me to ask my mother if she would sleep with the garbage man for a trillion dollars. I did, and she hesitated, but said, "As awful as it sounds, I absolutely would for a trillion dollars." I told my father what she said. He sat me down and said, "Son, here's the difference: In theory, WE'RE TRILLIONAIRES! But in REALITY, we just live with a bunch of whores."
It will be some 15 year old who gets funded through Y-combinator. He'll only be able to enjoy it for three years though, because they'll be going children of the corn on anyone who stays in tech past 18.
Instead of 40 year olds running around with IPhones and trendy gadgets to look young, 21 year olds will be applying special pro-acne solutions to their face to try and pass as 17.
Gates donated 30B to the Foundation. So his wealth growth does not suck as much as his haters wishes. Gates also has the biggest single family office in the world (Cascade) and as far as I know they're doing alright.
The article is weak in that it implies that diversification is good. Obviously, to get a random trillionaire, you want to increase risk. Who cares if bachelor #1 goes bankrupt? Maybe #2 will get the gazillions. As many mentioned here, single company entrepeneurs are more likely to get the first billion than some very wealthy closet indexer.
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