2026 Billionaire List: China Overtakes U.S, Switzerland Ranks Sixth

On number 3 with a much lower billionaire population of 308 was India. Germany overtook the U.K. to take fourth place with 171 billionaires. Meanwhile, Switzerland dropped from the 5th to the 6th place.

Elon Musk topped the list of individuals for the fifth time in six years. In 2026, his wealth exceeded $792 billion, driven by a massive increase in the valuations of SpaceX and Tesla. Musk is the first person ever to surpass $700 billion. Jeff Bezos of Amazon retained second place with $300 billion wealth, boosted by Amazon's AI-powered cloud computing and with the growth of Blue Origin’s space programs.

Jensen Huang of Nvidia was the only new entrant in the top 10 list. His wealth reached $172 billion; a 34% gain year-on-year driven by the rising demand for Nvidia's GPU architecture used for AI infrastructure.

Bernard Arnault of LVMH, the only non-American billionaire in the top 10 list, retained his 7th spot. After purchasing more shares in his own company, earlier this year, his wealth increased by 13%. His family now collectively holds over 50% of the company’s shares.

Interestingly, China’s billionaires enter the rich list at only the 26th rank; Zhong ShanShan, aged 72, and founder of Yangshengtang (YST), a major Chinese investment holding company saw his wealth rise by nearly 35% to $74 billion. Following him on number 27 is Tencent’s Ma Huateng, whose wealth grew by 50% reaching $66 billion.

U.S. citizens dominated the top 20 list. The only non-Americans other than Arnault are 2 Europeans and one Indian. Spanish billionaire Amancio Ortega of Inditex ranked 11th. His wealth grew by 17% year-on-year. India’s Mukesh Ambani and family - of Reliance industries ranked 17th. Françoise Bettencourt Meyers of L'Oréal, whose wealth increased by 37% year-on-year, took the 20th spot.

Notably, the only three Europeans to make the top 20 rich list in 2026 are from the fashion and beauty industries.

But for the larger global billionaire population, financial services was the most dominant industry and main source of wealth generation as about 9.9% of the top 4000 billionaires are making their money there, followed by media & entertainment, and retail & consumer goods sectors.

In Switzerland, which ranked 6th, most of its 114 billionaires are from the healthcare sector, followed by financial services and consumer goods.

The wealthiest new entrant in Hurun’s rich list is from Switzerland. Italian origin Andrea Pignataro of ION Group ranked at number 64 in Hurun’s top 100 richest people in the world. He is based in Switzerland. Pignataro is a dominant but private figure in the fintech industry. Under his leadership, the company has expanded aggressively through strategic acquisitions of specialized fintech firms, including Dealogic, Fidessa, and Cedacri. While Hurun counts his wealth at $32 billion, according to Forbes it exceeds $41 billion. Despite his massive wealth, he features in the Hurun list for the first time due to an updated valuation model of his private empire.