8 Billionaires In Virginia, DC Make Forbes 2019 List (2024)

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The number of billionaires and their net worth is down, Forbes said of its 2019 list. See which VA, DC billionaires are in the elite club.

8 Billionaires In Virginia, DC Make Forbes 2019 List (4)

WASHINGTON, DC — Jeff Bezos is at the top of Forbes' billionaires list for 2019, his second year atop the famed ranking since dethroning fellow Seattle-area billionaire Bill Gates. Among the elite club of billionaires on the 32nd annual list, seven of them have Virginia ties, while President Donald Trump is listed as the only billionaire who calls the District of Columbia home. Virginia gained one billionaire from a year ago thanks to a public offering of a software services company.

Here are the Virginia billionaires who made the Forbes list for 2019:

  • Jacqueline Mars, 79, is worth $23.6 billion and ranked at No. 33 on the list. Mars and her siblings inherited McLean-based Mars Inc., in 1999 when their father, Forrest Sr., died. Mars is known for candy (3 Musketeers, M&Ms, MilkyWay, etc.) but has many other brands outside the sweets area, including pet food and gum.
  • Winifred Johnson-Marquart, 59, is worth $3.8 billion and is ranked at No. 546 on the list. Johnson-Marquart, of Virginia Beach, is president of the Johnson Family Foundation and an heir to the SC Johnson family fortune. The SC Johnson Co. is best known for brands such as Ziploc, Glade, Drano and Pledge.
  • William Conway Jr., 69, is worth $2.7 billion and ranked No. 838 on the list. Conway, of McLean, is one of three billionaires who founded and control the $178 billion private equity firm Carlyle Group. He serves as co-CEO along with David Rubenstein. Daniel D'Aniello is chairman. They took the firm public in 2012; Conway previously worked for MCI Communications as CFO.
  • Daniel D'Aniello, 72, is worth $2.7 billion and is also ranked No. 838. D'Aniello, of Vienna, is one of the co-founders of private equity firm Carlyle Group. Today he runs the day-to-day operations of the firm. Forbes notes D'Aniello's humble beginnings, growing up in Butler, Pennsylvania, working to help his single mom by bagging groceries. He attended Syracuse University on a scholarship and went on to earn an MBA from Harvard. D'Aniello has made charitable gifts to several universities, including Syracuse.
  • Steve Case, 60, is worth $1.3 billion and is ranked No. 1717 on the list. Case, of McLean, is the founder of AOL, and his investment company, Revolution, has funded startups like Washington, D.C.-based LivingSocial and Sweetgreen. Recent investments include DraftKings, a Boston-based online fantasy sports contest provider. In 1985, Case helped found Quantum Computer Services. He became CEO in 1991 and changed its name to America Online. AOL merged with Time Warner in 2001 in a $164 billion deal that was eventually deemed one of the worst mergers in history. Case chairs Accelerate Brain Cancer Cure, a nonprofit he founded with his late brother, Dan.
  • Theodore Leonsis, 63, is worth $1.1 billion and is ranked No. 1941 on the list. Leonsis, of Great Falls, is the founder, majority owner and CEO of Monumental Sports, which owns several teams in Washington, D.C. Those include the NBA's Wizards, the NHL's Capitals, the WNBA's Washington Mystics, and Capital One Arena.
  • Matthew Calkins, 46, is worth $1 billion and is ranked No. 2057 on the list. Calkins, of Rosslyn, is the cofounder and CEO of Appian, a cloud computing company he began when he was 26. Nearly one third of Appian's 350 customers are on the Forbes Global list of the world's biggest companies. He is new to the Forbes list this year.
  • Donald Trump, 72, who was a lifelong New Yorker until winning the White House in 2016, ranks at No. 715 on the list with a net worth of $3.1 billion, earned in television and real estate.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who is worth about $131 billion, topped the list for the second year in a row, followed by software magnate and philanthropist Bill Gates ($96.5 billion) and Berkshire Hathaway Chairman and CEO Warren Buffett ($82.5 billion).

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Both the number of billionaires and their combined net worth is down this year, according to Forbes. Last year, 2,208 people made the list and had a combined wealth of $9.1 trillion. Forbes said this represents the first decrease in billionaires and their combined wealth since 2016, and only the second decrease in a decade.

A record 994 billionaires are worth less than they were a year ago, but last year, only 360 members of the elite class got poorer. The average net worth of this year’s billionaires is $4 billion, down from $4.1 billion in 2018. Of the total, 1,450 members are self-made.

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“The billionaire ranks prove that even the world’s richest are not immune to economic forces and the volatility of world markets. Yet, even with strong headwinds, resourceful and relentless entrepreneurs find new ways to get rich,” Luisa Kroll, assistant managing editor of wealth at Forbes said in a news release.

Kerry A. Dolan, also an assistant managing editor of wealth at Forbes, noted regional trends.

“Of note this year was the large number of drop-offs in China, and the weakening of the euro vs. the dollar, which pushed down the dollar value of European fortunes,” Dolan said in the release.

In the United States, Bezos’ net worth increased from $19 billion, and Gates, who had been the wealthiest person in the world for the longest period of time, increased his fortune by $6.5 billion, from $90 billion in 2018. The gap between the No. 1 and No. 2 billionaires grew due to an increase in Amazon stock prices. Buffett’s net worth fell by $1.5 billion.

Rounding out the top five were Bernard Arnault of France and Carlos Slim Helu of Mexico, with net worths of $76 billion and $64 billion, respectively.

New to the list is Kylie Jenner, 21, who is the youngest billionaire in the world and the youngest self-made billionaire of all time. Jenner, who ranked 2,057 on the list, owns 100 percent of Kylie Cosmetics, a company she founded three years ago and which did $360 million in sales last year. Most of the company’s revenue comes from e-commerce, but Kylie Cosmetics also has a deal with Ulta to put its products in the makeup retailer’s 1,163 U.S. stores.

Other Americans in the Top 20 were:

  • Larry Ellison, software magnate, No. 7 with a net worth of $62.5 billion (up from 2018);
  • Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder, No 8, with a net worth of $62.3 billion (down from 2018);
  • Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg LP, No. 9, with a net worth of $55.5 billion (up from 2018);
  • Larry Page, Google, No. 10, with a net worth of $50.8 billion (up from 2018);
  • Charles Koch and David Koch, Koch Industries, No. 11, with a net worth of $50.5 billion (down from 2018);
  • Sergey Brin, Google, No. 14, with a net worth of $49.8 billion (up from 2018);
  • Jim Walton, Walmart, No. 16, with a net worth of $44.6 billion (down from 2018);
  • Alice Walton, Walmart, No. 17, with a net worth of $44.4 billion (down from 2018);
  • S. Robson Walton, Walmart, No 18, with a net worth of $44.3 billion (down from 2018);
  • Steve Ballmer, Microsoft, No. 19, with a net worth of $41.2 billion (up from 2018).

The Top 20 billionaires have a combined net worth of $1.2 trillion, which is unchanged from last year. Their aggregate wealth represents about 14 percent of all billionaires. The minimum net worth in the Top 20 was $3.38 billion, $200 million less than 2018.

Go here to view the complete list.

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