May 06, 2014
The world’s first trillionaire could emerge within just 25 years, financial forecasters have claimed.
Bill Gates, the Microsoft founder and world's richest person, is expected by many to be the first to reach trillionaire status.
If the world’s greatest fortunes continue to grow at their current rate, boosted by the rapid wealth creation in emerging markets such as India and China, then Gates or one of the planet’s super-rich elite could have a trillion US dollars to their name by 2039, according to some predictions.
Others, such as investment bank Credit Suisse, believe there will be 11 trillionaires within just two generations.
“Two generations ahead, future extrapolation of current wealth growth rates yields almost a billion millionaires, equivalent to 20 per cent of the total adult population,” the bank wrote in its annual Global Wealth Report last year.
“If this scenario unfolds, then billionaires will be commonplace, and there is likely to be a few trillionaires too, eleven according to our best estimate.”
A trillion dollars is a million million or $1,000,000,000,000, the equivalent of $US140 for every person on the planet.
It is enough money to buy up every last inch of property in central London at today’s prices, according to The Times.
Mr Gates, 58, currently the richest man on Earth with a fortune of about $US120 billion, is widely expected to be the world’s first trillionaire.
If the US national wealth carries on growing at its current rate and the richest few continue to increase their share of it in an increasingly polarised economy, Mr Gates will claim the title of world’s first trillionaire in his old age.
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