The American national business magazine, Forbes, compiled and published the list of billionaires including the world’s wealthiest people as of the first quarter 2009, based on each person’s total net worth.
Bad news for rich people: last year there were 1,125 billionaires, but this year there are just 793 people rich enough to make the list that means a 30% decline from a year ago.
The world’s richest are also a lot poorer. Their collective net worth is $2.4 trillion, down $2 trillion from a year ago. Their average net worth fell 23% to $3 billion.
“Billionaire Bust”, is the red title on the cover of this month’s Forbes special issue that demonstrated how hard the crisis had struck on the richest people on the planet.
The Chinese Communist Party has told its members to embrace austerity after a series of embarrassing revelations about extravagant business trips.
The latest scandal came when 14 officials from the southern province of Guangdong went on a two-week junket around Africa and the Middle East that included a stay at the Burj al-Arab, a seven-star hotel in Dubai.
The junket, which included stops to buy diamonds and a belly-dancing show, was exposed by Chinese bloggers last week.
Do you guys know CBC Television Show called FORTUNE HUNTERS (which is all about Canadian entrepreneurs) ?
They’ve just launched their second season, and you should watch their upcoming luxury-themed episode.
They’re featuring two stories : one about an entrepreneur who is starting up a caviar business and the other one is about an entrepreneur that has made it big with a jet-sharing company.
The whole episode is streamed on their website.
The Telegraph has a receipt for a bill at Maya, a club in London’s Soho area that shows a £43,067.50 bar bill from this week.
The astonishing bar bill included two methuselah of Dom Perignon champagne at £9,000 each, and four jeroboam of Crystal champagne costing £4,500 each.
A methuselah is eight times the normal bottle size, and a jeroboam four times.
Here is a Rucksack that will match every luxury loving billionaire’s lifestyle: the much anticipated gold rucksack from the Billionaire Boys Club S/S 2009 Collection has been released.
Very similar in style to the original Louis Vuitton rucksack, the backpack features the brands diamond/dollar monogram pattern all-over.
Only four of these are available for $1,650. The bag also comes with a “Dollars & Diamonds” dust bag version as well.
Source: Highsnobiety
The immense popularity of the Pershing brand on the Chinese market has been reconfirmed for 2009, too.
An awards ceremony was held recently in the elegant setting of the Hotel Pudong Shangri-La in Shanghai, during which Pershing, a Ferretti S.p.A. brand and famous Italian shipyard specialising in the production of luxury yachts, was presented with the important “Best Luxury Performance Yacht 2009” award, following data issued by the “Best of the Best” survey.
The “Best of the Best” is the most authoritative survey which the Editorial Office of “The Hurun Report”, an important Chinese magazine devoted to the financial world and luxury, has drawn up every year for the past five in order to make an in-depth investigation of the lifestyles and spending habits of the most prominent figures in the Chinese economy.
