New No. 1

For First Time in 24 Years, a New No. 1 on Forbes 400

Jeff Bezos unseats Bill Gates

By Evann Gastaldo

In this Sept. 13, 2018, file photo, Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO, speaks in Washington.   (AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File)

Jeff Bezos recently became the richest person in modern history, and on Wednesday came another milestone for the Amazon founder:


Seemingly as inevitable as death and taxes, the rich once again have grown richer. For the first time since 1994, there is a new No. 1, as Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos breaks Bill Gates’ 24 year run at the top. Bezos is also the first person to appear in the ranks with a fortune of more than $100 billion—he clocked in at $160 billion, thanks to an astonishing one year gain of $78.5 billion. The minimum net worth to join this exclusive club hit an all-time high of $2.1 billion while the average net worth for a Forbes 400 member rose half a billion to a record $7.2 billion. At these lofty highs, more than a third of the nation’s billionaires, a record 204, weren't wealthy enough to crack the club. Even still, 15 newcomers climbed into the ranks, including Ripple’s Chris Larsen, the first person in the ranks to make their money from crypto-currency; Drew Houston, CEO of newly public online file-sharing firm Dropbox, and In-N-Out heiress Lynsi Synder, now the youngest woman on the Forbes 400 at age 36. The rest of the top 10:

2. Bill Gates, $97 billion
3. Warren Buffett, $88.3 billion
4. Mark Zuckerberg, $61 billion
5. Larry Ellison, $58.4 billion
6. Larry Page, $53.8 billion
7. Charles Koch, $53.5 billion
8. David Koch, $53.5 billion
9. Sergey Brin, $52.4 billion
10. Michael Blooomberg, $51.8 billion