Billionaires: Kings, Queens & Despots

by Forbes

Sat, Mar 1, 2003 1:09PM

Valuing these fortunes is a tricky business. We exclude, for example, assets held in trust for a nation--like Buckingham Palace. It belongs not so much to Queen Elizabeth II as to the British state, much as the White House belongs to the U.S. government. Some estimates are fuzzier than others. We calculate Fidel Castro's wealth as a percentage of Cuba's GDP. Why do we separate these folks from our main ranking? They don't exactly represent success stories of entrepreneurial capitalism.

Name Title
/Country Age Estimated
worth

King Fahd Bin Abdul Aziz Alsaud Crown Prince & King
/Saudi Arabia 80, $20 billion*

Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Sultan
/Brunei 56, $11 billion*

Hans Adam II Prince
/Liechtenstein 58, $2 billion*

Saddam Hussein President
/Iraq 65, $2 billion*

Queen Elizabeth II Queen
/United Kingdom 76, $525 million

Yasir Arafat President
/Palestinian Authority 73, $300 million*

Queen Beatrix Wilhelmina Armgard Queen
/Netherlands 65, $250 million

Fidel Castro President
/Cuba 76, $110 million*

*At least

Add Your Comments

Support Independent Media

We are 100% volunteer and depend on your participation to sustain our efforts!