There are plenty of people eager to see the calendar turn on 2017, a year full of political chaos, a worsening drug epidemic, and fears of nuclear apocalypse, but one group that will be sad to see 2017 go are the richest people in the world. They actually got richer in 2017.
All told, the 500 wealthiest people in the world added $1 trillion in wealth in the past 12 months, Bloomberg reports. The 23 percent increase in wealth is four times the 2016 gain and is largely due to the soaring stock market, which pushed the total wealth of the fabulous 500 up to $5.3 trillion.
The biggest beneficiary of 2017 was Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, whose fortune soared by $34.2 billion in the past year. At one point in November, he was worth more than $100 billion. In the months since, his fortune has dropped to $99.6 billion, but that’s still enough to make him the richest person in the world, with Bill Gates and his $91.3 billion not far behind in second place.
