Mark Zuckerberg Leads List Of 2016's Biggest Billionaire Gainers

By Chase Peterson-Withorn

Thanks to sinking oil prices and rocky global stock markets, 2015 wasn’t the most lucrative year for billionaires. Although the number of ten-digit fortunes fell from 1,826 to 1,810 and majority of the world’s richest saw their wealth decline or stagnate, this year’s ten biggest dollar gainers added a collective $62.5 billion to their fortunes. While the typical billionaire’s net worth fell from $3.86 billion in 2015 to $3.58 billion in 2016, these ten best-performers gained $6.25 billion each on average.

Mark Zuckerberg led the way, adding $11.2 billion to his net worth as Facebook shares rose 35%. The ubiquitous social network grew revenues 44% to $18 billion as it added 200 million new monthly active users. Zuckerberg, the world’s sixth-richest person with $44.6 billion, seems to be more active than ever, using his profile to share company news and family photos of his dog and newborn daughter, Max. This might be the last time Zuck is the biggest billionaire gainer though: In December he and his wife, Priscilla, announced plans to donate 99% of their Facebook stock — nearly all of their wealth — to charitable causes during their lives.

Zuckerberg beats out Amazon founder and chief executive Jeff Bezos, whose net worth climbed the second most — $10.4 billion this year — as the online retailing giant saw Prime membership rise 51%. It’s enough to place Bezos among the top five richest people in the world for the first time ever. He’s fifth-richest with a net worth of $45.2 billion.

Google, a third so-called “FANG” company (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google) also propelled its founders’ fortunes this year. Shares of Google’s new parent company, Alphabet, rose 24%, helping boost Larry Page and Sergey Brin by $5.5 billion and $5.2 billion, respectively. Page, now worth $35.2 billion, is the fourth-biggest gainer; Brin, who has $34.4 billion, is the seventh.

Being a tech titan is not a requirement for being a big gainer, though. Germany’s Heinz Hermann Thiele is the sixth-largest dollar gainer (up $5.3 billion to $11.7 billion) as his rail and commercial vehicle brake-maker, Knorr Bremse, boosted profits 53% to approximately $610 million. Beate Heister & Karl Albrecht Jr., siblings who inherited a stake in German discount grocer Aldi in 2014, shared a $4.6 billion gain as revenues for Aldi Sued — which controls Aldi stores in southern Germany plus places like the U.S., U.K. and Australia — rose 14% to an estimated $52 billion.y. He’s the world’s eighth-wealthiest person, with $40 billion.

Some fortunes, including those of Nigerian telecom tycoon Mike Adenuga and real estate developer Stephen Ross, are up due to new information obtained by Forbes that has allowed us to revise our estimates.

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