Table of contents for March 31, 2019 in Forbes

THIS MARKS the 33rd time we’ve produced the definitive chronicle of the world’s richest people—a project that serves both to inspire and to transparently inform the public about who owns what where. Across more than three decades, we’ve seen numerous ups and downs in the financial cycle—and the public’s relationship with billionaires. Right now, the political winds blow against the ultrarich, in large part because many people rightly feel they don’t have a fair shot at such success. In “Reimagining Capitalism,” starting on page 30, I lay out three ways to move forward. In an effort to lead, rather than merely chronicle, we’ll start with ourselves. Inclusivity: Opportunity starts at the first rungs of the ladder. Through our Under 30 platform, we’re going to expand our Under 30 Scholars program,…

IF THERE WERE an award for comedic incompetence in statecraft, Britain would win, hands down. The Sceptred Isle has thoroughly botched Brexit since the referendum took place in June 2016. The country’s economy today is at a virtual standstill, and how the divorce with the EU will unfold remains a mystery. The ruling conservative government has been so inept that the inconceivable could happen: The anti-American, anti-Semitic, malignant Marxist leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, might become the next prime minister. (Seven Labour members of Parliament recently quit the party because of his venomous views.) The country had an opportunity to shape itself as a global economic powerhouse, combining the best of Switzerland, Hong Kong and Singapore. The soaring success this would have engendered would have had EU countries…

EVEN BEFORE GRADUATING from the University of California, Berkeley, Masayoshi Son nurtured big dreams, brainstorming 40 potential startups and working out how he’d “start a business, amass capital and eventually hand the creation over to a chosen successor,” Forbes wrote. Son got going after he left college, founding Softbank, a software distribution business, in 1981. By the late’90s it was a sprawling venture firm with investments in more than 100 internet companies (Yahoo, E-Trade, GeoCities) worth nearly $20 billion. “The digital revolution will make mankind happier and more productive, and that won’t change over the next 300 years,” Son told us. Son, whose wealth totaled $6.4 billion, didn’t want to control “a single behemoth like Amazon.com,” we wrote, but sought “sizable stakes in top players in myriad niches.” Said Gary…

BILL CARTEAUX #1 Challenger Raised $232,735 PLASTICS Industry Association CHUCK KIVEN SK2 Campus Living DAN RYAN PwC DWAYNE WILSON Salesforce HEATH MELTON The Howard Hughes Corporation CHUCK CUDA OPES Commercial Real Estate ARE YOU UP FOR THE CHALLENGE? Become a 2019 Executive Challenger LightTheNight.org Guy Adami, CNBC Fast Money David Adams III, Adams Capital Tamara Amini, Bank of America Paul Anbinder, Retired Founding Publisher and President of Hudson Hills Press Adam Andolina, KeyBank Ray Armini, Peninsula Country Club Aubrey Arreola, WVC Shelley Assencao Anna Backman, HCA MidAmerica Division Martin and Terrill Bahar, USC Chris Ballard, Airbnb Mario Barnaba, Barnaba & Marconi LLP Tedd Barr, Converze Media Group Michael Barrett, Unosquare Missy K Bass, C & F Mortgage Co. Diane Baylor, PricewaterhouseCoopers Kathy Belfiore, Agios Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Heath & Harry Bennett,…

In 2000, R.J Shook and his team became the world’s first to research and rank Wealth Advisors. Now, with dozens of competitors, SHOOK Research is the only organization that focuses on the quality of the advisor—including telephone and inperson meetings—in addition to its quantitative measures. SHOOK’s goal is to recognize those advisors having the biggest impact on their clients’ lives. Readers regularly ask us for ways to contact the ranked advisors—Forbes’ solution: the Top Advisor Directory. Once an advisor has earned a spot on a ranking, they are eligible to pay a fee to be placed in this directory; participation has no bearing on any ranking. Congratulations to our advisors who are the role models of the industry, and dedicated to the highest professional standards. S. WESLEY CARPENTER Merrill Lynch…

555 CALIFORNIA STREET SAN FRANCISCO $452M ▴ $105M 1290 AVENUE OF THE AMERICAS NYC $446M ▴ $55M 40 WALL STREET NYC $338M ▾ $57M TRUMP TOWER NYC $218M ▾ $27M Trump Tower has taken in nearly $1 million in rent from his 2020 campaign and the Republican National Committee since Donald Trump became president. TEN GOLF COURSES IN SIX U.S. STATES PLUS WASHINGTON, D.C. $192M ▸ 6 EAST 57TH STREET (FORMERLY NIKETOWN) NYC $191M ▾ $37M Nike vacated the building last year, but Trump is still collecting rent. Jewelry giant Tiffany is covering some of the cost by subleasing from the apparel maker, and Nike’s new landlords are making up the difference, according to a source familiar with the deal. HOTEL MANAGEMENT & LICENSING $170M ▸ TRUMP PARK AVENUE NYC…

MERLE WOOD KNOWS YACHTS. This fact is evidenced by a client list that reads like a “Who’s Who” of the world’s most highly successful individuals. Raised by a yacht broker father, Wood lived on a boat for several years as a child and sold his first one at 18 years old. Since launching his company in 1988, Merle Wood & Associates has surpassed expectations, amassing well over $30 billion in yacht deals to date, and has been a top global deal-producing yacht brokerage company for over 25 years. Leading a team of astute sales professionals, CEO Wood is a master of expertly navigating the yachting industry. His philosophy is simple: “It is important to sell a yacht knowing the client is going to be happy with it, so that he…

“We want to be envied. We want to be immortal. We want to be gods. But in addition, we want wisdom and justice. We want hope. We want to be good.” —MARGARET ATWOOD “He reminded her of the way male lions look sad, as if their nobility is a terrible weight.” —ELIZABETH KOSTOVA “VIRTUE AND VICE ARE LIKE LIFE AND DEATH OR MIND AND MATTER: THINGS WHICH CANNOT EXIST WITHOUT BEING QUALIFIED BY THEIR OPPOSITE.” —SAMUEL BUTLER “IT IS FOR YOUR PRIVATE PLEASURE THAT YOU GIVE TWOPENCE TO A BEGGAR AS MUCH AS IT IS FOR MY PRIVATE PLEASURE THAT I DRINK ANOTHER WHISKEY AND SODA.” —W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM “You can fake virtue for an audience. You can’t fake it in your own eyes.” —AYN RAND “Content thyself to be…

• Leonti 103 West 77th St. (Tel.: 212-362-3800) Every part of Chef Adam Leonti’s restaurant blends together to offer a memorable evening. Each course hits a high mark. The amazing breads are made from flour milled on the premises (the same is true with the flour in the pastas and the desserts). Try the Diver scallops, the Roman artichoke lasagna, the cinnamon-scented fettuccine tossed with wild boar ragu or the turbot al forno (a delicately cooked fish). The cheese course is an array of unusual Italian choices. Desserts are mandatory, particularly the tiered tower of petits fours. • Silos Baking Co. 601 Webster Ave., Waco, Texas (Tel.: 254-235-0603) Joanna Gaines has surpassed herself at her jewel box of a bakery at her Magnolia Market in Waco. The cookies are divine,…

KYLIE JENNER | AGE: 21 | U.S. NET WORTH: $1 BILLION At 21, Jenner is the youngest-ever selfmade billionaire, earning a ten-figure fortune even earlier than Mark Zuckerberg (who joined the billionaires list at 23 in 2008). “I didn’t expect anything—I did not foresee the future,” Jenner says. “But [the recognition] feels really good. That’s a nice pat on the back.” She owns 100% of Kylie Cosmetics, the three-year-old beauty business that did an estimated $360 million in sales last year. Most of the company’s revenue comes from e-commerce. But Kylie Cosmetics also has a new deal with Ulta that put its goods in all the makeup retailer’s 1,163 U.S. stores, “so people that would never buy my products—or that aren’t my fans—can see them in person.” NEWCOMERS BY COUNTRY…

SITTING IN A MODEST ROOM IN NEW YORK’S immodest Peninsula Hotel, the richest person in the world for most of the past 20 years ponders an existential question suddenly in vogue among the left’s confiscatory set: Should he even exist? “It is fascinating,” says Bill Gates, “that for the first time in my life, people are saying, ‘Okay, should you have billionaires?’” Dispassionately, he begins to unpack that thesis. “I’m afraid if you really implemented something like that, that the amount you would gain would be much less than the amount you would lose. Now, that sounds self-interested, so who’s the neutral witness on this one? … We need somebody who’s not wealthy to say that in some cases allowing people to be wealthy is okay.” Allow me to raise…

Pacing the streets of midtown Manhattan, it’s hard to avoid the president of the United States. Trump Tower, with its boldfaced lettering and battle-armed guards, looms over Fifth Avenue. A couple of blocks away stand Trump Parc and Trump Parc East. There are also Trump International Hotel & Tower, Trump World Tower and Trump Plaza. Hidden among them is another Trump property, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, a hulking skyscraper that doesn’t have the president’s name on it but is worth more than any of the others. That’s not a coincidence. For years, Donald Trump has touted his own name, at one point telling Forbes it was worth $5 billion alone in goodwill. But what was once an asset—though certainly not a $5 billion one—has become a liability, especially in…