Worth $85 Billion, Gates Still Tops List of Richest Americans : Money: Four Orange County residents also make Forbes' ranking of the nation's 400 wealthiest people.

L.A. Times Archives

Sept. 24, 1999 12 AM PT

From Times Staff and Wire Reports

NEW YORK —

The 400 richest Americans are worth more than $1 trillion combined--and that tops the gross domestic product of China, Forbes magazine said Thursday.

Ninety-eight of the richest 400 live in California. They include four Orange County residents and the founder of another company in the county.

Bill Gates is still America’s wealthiest, with a net personal worth of $85 billion, up from $59 billion last year. Microsoft Corp.’s founder and chairman, whose net worth briefly touched $100 billion last April, still has more money than the gross domestic product of the Philippines ($83.1 billion).

Real estate mogul Donald Bren, 67, is once again the richest person in Orange County with an estimated net worth of $3.2 billion, up more than 10% from the previous year. Bren, a Newport Beach resident, is owner of the Irvine Co., Orange County’s biggest developer with 50,000 acres, or about one-fifth of the county. He ranked 68th on the list. A year ago, he ranked as the 48th richest American.

Henry Nicholas, 40, and Henry Samueli, 45, co-founders of Irvine-based semiconductor giant Broadcom Corp., ranked 90th with a net worth of $2.6 billion each, a substantial jump in the pair’s wealth. In 1998, Forbes estimated Nicholas’ net worth at $900 million and Samueli’s at $850 million.

The value of the company’s stock has surged nearly 77% since the beginning of the year. The two Henrys, as they’re known, made their first appearance on the Forbes 400 last year.

Jim Jannard, 50, founder and chairman of Foothill Ranch sunglass maker Oakley Inc., ranked 296th with an estimated net worth of $850 million, down from $1 billion the previous year. Jannard, whose primary residence is in the San Juan Islands, Wash., ranked 179th the previous year.

Getty Oil heiress Anne Catherine Getty Earhart ranked 344th. The 47-year-old Laguna Beach resident’s net worth is estimated at $740 million, up about 6% from last year’s $700 million estimate.

Kingston Technology Corp. founders David Sun and John Tu fell off the list this year, a reflection of the industrywide slump in the demand and price of the memory-chip products the Fountain Valley company makes. Earlier this year, the pair bought back an 80% stake in Kingston from Japanese conglomerate Softbank Corp. for about one-third of the 1996 selling price.

What’s even more surprising about the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans, published in the edition dated Oct. 11, is that it proves that the United States really is a country where someone can get rich quick.

It took the legendary John D. Rockefeller 25 years to make his first billion, but Gary Winnick (68th on the Forbes 400 with $3.2 billion) joined the billionaire’s club just 18 months after putting his money into the undersea fiber-optic cable builder Global Crossing Ltd.

Jay Walker, founder of Internet commerce company Priceline.com Inc., who ranks 43rd with $4.1 billion, became a billionaire nearly as fast, and Pierre Omidyar, founder of Internet auctioneer EBay Inc., has vaulted from nowhere into the 35th spot with $4.9 billion.

With a surging stock market driven by technology and Internet companies, the number of billionaires swelled by 79 to 268 this year--the first year billionaires make up more than half the Forbes list.

In 1982 there were just 13 billionaires in the United States, and now there are about 5 million lowly millionaires. Of the 60 new names on this year’s list, 35 are billionaires and 19 have fortunes derived from Web businesses.

Behind Gates is No. 2-ranked Paul Allen, who also got rich via Microsoft stock and who has a net worth of $40 billion. Investor Warren Buffett is third with $31 billion, while Steven Ballmer, Microsoft’s president, and Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computer Corp., rank fourth and fifth.

The magazine grouped the rich into various categories to make comparisons among people who made their money in the same areas: Among the categories are: Microsoft Money, Cable Guys, Hard Drivers, Kings Of the Code, Web Masters, Bandwidth Boys, Media Moguls, You’ve Got Money, Financiers, Inheritors, Landlords, Rag Traders, Optionaires, Jocks, Money Managers, Old Money and Retailers.

One thing is certain, the indigent need not apply--the minimum to qualify for this year’s list is $625 million, up from $500 million last year.

Staff writer Marc Ballon and Reuters contributed to this report.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Forbes’ Wealthiest

The 15 richest Americans, as compiled by Forbes magazine:

Bill Gates III, 43, $85 billion

Paul Allen, 46, $40 billion

Warren Buffett, 69, $31 billion

Steven Ballmer, 43, $23 billion

Michael Dell, 34, $20 billion

Alice L. Walton, 50; Helen R. Walton, 80; Jim C. Walton, 51; John T. Walton, 53; S. Robson Walton, 55, $17 billion

Gordon Earl Moore, 70 $15 billion