Finance-Investment Sector Produces Most Billionaires

The world's ultra-rich are not evenly distributed across the globe or across economic sectors, so their wealth tends to cluster in just a few fast-growing, high-profit industries, according to visualcapitalist.com.

The cited source presents the main sources of wealth of the ultra-rich, by industry, based on figures from the World's Billionaires List, 2025 edition, compiled by Forbes. All figures presented are valid as of March 7, 2025.

• 464 billionaires made their fortunes from finance and investment

With 464 billionaires - 15.3% of the 2025 total - the finance and investment industry retains its crown as the most important billionaire-generating field. The group added 37 new names in 2025 compared to 2024, fueled by strong stock markets, record private equity outflows and a rebound in hedge fund performance. According to Forbes, these billionaires include: Theresia Gouw (venture capital investments, estimated net worth: $1.1 billion); Adebayo Ogunlesi (private equity, $2.2 billion) and George Raymond Zage III (Grindr stake, $1.2 billion).

However, the "Oracle of Omaha,” Warren Buffett, with an estimated net worth of $154 billion, remains the richest billionaire in the sector. His company, Berkshire Hathaway, continues to thrive thanks to returns from its extensive portfolio of railroads, insurance, utilities and consumer brands.

• More tech billionaires

Tech will have 401 billionaires in 2025, nearly 14% of the global total, up 59 from last year, the source said. After a difficult 2022-2023, the sector has enjoyed a sharp recovery as AI-powered productivity tools, cloud demand and a semiconductor shortage boosted valuations.

The richest tech billionaire is Mark Zuckerberg (CEO Meta), now worth $216 billion. Zuckerberg's AI ambitions have been fully revealed over the past year: aggressively acquiring talent to find the next big AI breakthrough.

A new tech billionaire is also working for Zuckerberg, Alexandr Wang, 28, co-founder and CEO of Scale AI.

In the ranking of wealth-generating industries we also find: manufacturing (leader Reinhold Wurth and family - Wurth Group -, with a fortune of 35.1 billion dollars); fashion & retail (Bernard Arnault and family - LVMH, with 178 billion dollars); health (Thomas Frist Jr. and family - HCA Healthcare, 27 billion dollars); food and beverage (Zhong Shanshan - Nongfu Spring, 57.7 billion dollars).

• Elon Musk, in the category of "auto billionaires"

Elon Musk is the richest person in the world, with a fortune of 342 billion dollars, but thanks, in large part, to his participation in the electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla, Forbes classifies him as an "automotive billionaire". However, in 2025, Elon Musk is also betting on artificial intelligence. In fact, the rise of conglomerate founders and multi-industry entrepreneurs suggests that future billionaire lists may be defined less by a single core business and more by sprawling, cross-industry empires.

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