Only 243 of the world's 2,153 billionaires are women, according to Forbes recent report on the richest people in the world.
From that list of the 50 richest people, only five are women. Two of those five are Americans. The richest American woman is Alice Walton, the only daughter of Walmart founder Sam Walton. The second richest American woman is Jacqueline Mars, whose family started Mars, Inc., the country’s largest candymaker.
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Forbes’ annual wealth report on the world’s billionaires list is a snapshot of wealth using stock prices and exchange rates from Feb. 8, 2019. Some people became richer or poorer within days of publication, so the reports findings have some discrepancies.
These are the 10 wealthiest women in the world for 2019, according to Forbes, with their world ranking in parentheses.
10. Kwong Siu-hing, $15.1 billion (No. 78)
Kwong’s source of wealth is real estate. She is the widow of Kwok Tak-seng, who founded Sun Hung Properties in China. She served as the company’s chairman 2008-2011.
9. Gina Rinehart: $15.2 billion (No. 75)
Australia's richest citizen built her wealth on iron ore, Forbes reported. When her father died, she took his bankrupted estate and grew it into something much larger. She is also Australia’s third largest cattle producer.
8. Iris Fontbona: $15.4 billion (No. 74)
Fontbona is the widow of Andronico Luksic, who made his money in mining and beverages in Chile. She and her sons also own a majority stake in Quiñenco, a publicly traded Chilean conglomerate active in banking, beer and manufacturing.
7. Abigail Johnson: $15.6 billion (No. 71)
Johnson has been CEO of mutual fund giant Fidelity Investments since 2014, when she took over for her father. She has been chairman of the company her grandfather founded since 2016.
6. Laurene Powell Jobs: $18.6 billion (No 54)
Powell Jobs’ money comes from stakes in Apple and Disney she inherited from her husband, Steve Jobs. In 2004, she founded the for-profit social impact firm Emerson Collective.
5. Susanne Klatten: $21 billion (No. 46)
Klatten’s mother was the third wife of Herbert Quandt, who guided BMW into the luxury vehicle market, and left Klatten nearly 20 percent ownership of the automaker. She is sole owner and deputy chairman of Altana, which her grandfather founded, and holds stakes in a variety of other companies in Germany.
4. Yang Huiyan: $22.1 billion (No. 42)
Yang inherited 57 percent of Chinese real estate developer Country Garden Holdings. She also chairs Bright Scholar Education Holdings, which is a Chinese education company.
3. Jacqueline Mars: $23.9 billion (No. 33)
Mars owns about a third of the world’s largest candymaker, Mars Inc. She worked for the company for 20 years and served on its board until 2016. Now she is a philanthropist who serves on six boards, including the Smithsonian and the National Archives. She is one of only two American women in Forbes’ top 50 richest people in the world.
2. Alice Walton: $44.4 billion (No. 17)
Walton is the other American woman in the top 50. She is the only daughter of Walmart founder Sam Walton. Unlike her siblings, who work for Walmart, Walton prefers to curate art. She opened the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas.
1. Francoise Bettencourt Meyers: $49.3 billion (No. 15)
The richest woman in the world is the granddaughter of L’Oreal’s founder and holds a 33 percent stake in the company. She has served on the board of L’Oreal since 1997. She also serves as president of her family’s foundation, “which encourages French progress in the sciences and arts,” according to Forbes.
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