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Carlos Slim Helu

Net worth: $73 billion

Source of wealth: telecommunications

Nationality: Mexico

The owner of the Latin American telecommunications empire America Movil holds the lead in the global ranking of billionaires for the fourth year in a row. Over the past 12 months, the Mexican's fortune has grown by another $4 billion, despite an unsuccessful attempt to hit the jackpot on European telecoms. In addition to investments in the communications industry, 73-year-old Slim is actively invested in the coal mining industry, banking sector, real estate and tobacco business and even has a stake in The New York Times newspaper. Over the past year, the tycoon’s portfolio of assets has been replenished with three football clubs (Mexican Leon and Pachuca and Spanish Real Oviedo), although the billionaire is considered an ardent fan of baseball. Slim also continued to expand his approach to philanthropy as work to develop human abilities: his charitable foundation supported the educational project Khan Academy in January.

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Bill Gates

Net worth: $67 billion

Source of Wealth: Microsoft

Citizenship: USA

In recent years, the founder of the American software giant has devoted most of his time to the activities of his family charitable foundation. Despite this, Gates' fortune grew by $6 billion over the year thanks to the rise in the value of Microsoft shares. A businessman’s 5 percent stake in his “native” company is approximately a quarter of his capital. The rest of Gates' assets are successfully managed by the entrepreneur's investment company, Cascade Investment. Together with Warren Buffett, the Microsoft founder involved several dozen other owners of large fortunes in the Giving Pledge movement. Gates himself will direct at least $28 billion of his personal capital to charitable purposes. Another important endeavor of the billionaire is the distribution of medicines in third world countries. Gates estimates that effective control of infectious diseases could save up to 8 million lives by 2020.

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Amancio Ortega

Net worth: $57 billion

Source of wealth: Zara

Nationality: Spain

The founder of the Inditex trading empire (Zara brand) turned out to be the most successful participant in the Forbes ranking in 2012. His fortune grew by $19.5 billion over the year thanks to the intensive growth of his chain of stores. Ortega took away the title of the richest businessman in Europe from Bernard Arnault and removed Warren Buffett himself from third place in the global ranking. The Spanish tycoon, who left operational management of Inditex back in 2011, owns 59% of the company.

Ortega also has a rich portfolio of real estate assets. He owns office and residential buildings in Madrid, Miami and other cities.

Ortega's success story embodies the concept of self-made man . Having abandoned his studies at school, at the age of 13 the future billionaire got a job in a clothing store, and he made his first self-produced products together with his ex-wife in his living room.

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Warren Buffett

Net worth: $53.5 billion

Source of Wealth: Berkshire Hathaway

Citizenship: USA

At a recent meeting with the shareholders of his company, the legendary “Oracle of Omaha” admitted: 2012 was not the best year for Berkshire; none of the investments “shot” the way the billionaire would have liked. Despite this, Buffett’s fortune grew by almost $10 billion over the year, even though he himself fell out of the top three in the Forbes world ranking for the first time since 2000.

Over the past 12 months, Buffett has not revealed the secret of the name of his successor as head of Berkshire. He also continued his campaign with Bill Gates to attract business people to the Giving Pledge initiative, under which entrepreneurs will donate at least half of their wealth to charity. The “oracle” itself has already spent about $20 billion as a philanthropist.

In 2012, he took an active part in Barack Obama’s campaign, calling on wealthy Americans to voluntarily tighten the tax burden for the well-being of the state.

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Larry Ellison

Net worth: $43 billion

Source of Wealth: Oracle

Citizenship: USA

The Oracle founder increased his fortune by $7 billion over the past year after the company's shares began to rise again. Ellison also managed to acquire a personal island in Hawaii, purchasing it for $500 million along with the hotels and residential buildings located on it.

In May, the billionaire said that the purchase of Sun Microsystems in 2009 was fully justified: the $7.4 billion that Oracle paid for the company paid off after the new owner liquidated unprofitable areas of the business. Investors believed: Oracle shares grew by 20%, despite concerns about numerous patent disputes.

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Charles Koch

Net worth: $34 billion

Source of Wealth: Investments

Citizenship: USA

The world's richest brothers, owners of the second largest private US company Koch Industries, Charles and David Koch, each increased their wealth by $9 billion over the course of a year. The revenue of their business empire has grown to $115 billion, and their portfolio of assets continues to amaze with its diversity. Koch Industries, for example, is present in both the construction of oil pipelines and oil refining, and in the production of towels, cups and building materials.

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David Koch

Net worth: $34 billion

Source of Wealth: Investments

Citizenship: USA

The world's richest brothers, owners of the second largest private US company Koch Industries, Charles and David Koch, each increased their wealth by $9 billion over the course of a year. The revenue of their business empire has grown to $115 billion, and their portfolio of assets continues to amaze with its diversity. Koch Industries, for example, is present in both the construction of oil pipelines and oil refining, and in the production of towels, cups and building materials.

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Lee Ka-Shin

Net worth: $31 billion

Source of Wealth: Investments

Nationality: Hong Kong

Asia's richest businessman, Li Ka-shing, strengthened his position in the ranking; his fortune grew by $5.5 billion over the year. The Hong Kong tycoon's companies employ 270,000 people in 53 countries. His entities have built one in seven apartments in Hong Kong, his Hutchison Port Holdings handles 13% of the world's container traffic, and his Northumbrian Water supplies clean drinking water to 4.5 million people in England and sanitation for another 2.7 million. Lee also has personal investments to technology companies Facebook and Spotify.

The billionaire ceded operational management of his business empire to his sons Victor and Richard. Lee's latest major deals include the $1 billion purchase of British gas supplier Wales & West Utilities (a quarter of the UK gas supply market) and a $1.5 million investment in social TV platform Stevie.

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Liliane Bettencourt and family

Net worth: $30 billion

Source of wealth: L'Oreal

Nationality: France

The eccentric 90-year-old heiress of the L'Oreal cosmetics empire, after long legal feuds, fell under the guardianship of her own daughter Françoise. Oddly enough, this fact benefited the fortunes of the richest woman in the world - over the year, Bettencourt’s capital valuation increased by $6 billion due to successful market conditions. Under family pressure, Liliane also left the company's board, where she was replaced by her 25-year-old grandson Jean-Victor Meyer.

Another high-profile scandal involving Bettencourt gradually faded away - in 2008, her daughter accused her young friend, photographer Francois-Marie Barnier, of persuading him to obtain gifts totaling $1 billion from a wealthy patron.

Legally, Bettencourt has remained the sole legal heir to the L'Oréal empire since her father's death in 1957.

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Bernard Arnault and family

Net worth: $29 billion

Source of wealth: LVMH

Nationality: France

The French tycoon was the only one in the top 10 rankings to lose his fortune last year - his capital decreased by $12 billion. This was largely due to the conflict between the owner of the luxury empire LVMH and the government of his native country. After socialist François Hollande came to the presidency, wealthy French people were threatened with a 75 percent income tax, so Arnault decided to become a resident of neighboring Belgium and received an angry reaction from the “left.”

Christy Walton and family

Net worth: $28.2 billion

Source of Wealth: Wal-Mart

Citizenship: USA

The widow of John Walton, one of chain founder Sam Walton's three sons, saw his fortune rise by $2 billion thanks to a 2012 stock rally. The success of her late husband's investment in First Solar helped her get ahead of other members of the Walton family. Christy Walton continues to be the richest woman in the United States.

Stefan Persson

Net worth: $28 billion

Source of wealth: H&M

Nationality: Sweden

The head of the global chain of inexpensive clothing stores H&M has recently been increasingly making record deals in real estate. He bought the village of Linkenholt in Hampshire, UK, an entire block in Paris for $219 million, and is making good money from rent. However, the lion's share of his fortune comes from the H&M clothing chain, founded by his father in 1948. It currently includes 2,629 stores in 45 countries.

Michael Bloomberg

Net worth: $27 billion

Source of Wealth: Bloomberg

Citizenship: USA

As Bloomberg's term as mayor of New York came to an end, the billionaire took on a new challenge: ending gun violence in the city. He has already spent more than $2 million of personal funds on this. Bloomberg's total wealth increased by $5 billion over the year, primarily thanks to the agency created in 1982.

Jim Walton

Net worth: $26.7 billion

Source of Wealth: Wal-Mart

Citizenship: USA

The fortune of the youngest son of Wal-Mart founder Jim Walton, who is the CEO of the family bank Arvest Bank, for the first time approached the figure of $27 billion. The growth was ensured, first of all, by the positive dynamics of the company's shares this year.

Sheldon Adelson

Net worth: $26.5 billion

Source of wealth: casino

Citizenship: USA

The owner of the Las Vegas Sands casino empire, Sheldon Adelson, suffered losses in the last presidential election - he donated at least $53 million to the losing Republican candidate. However, Adelson's casinos continue to win - their shares have risen in price by more than 20% since last summer.

Alice Walton

Net worth: $26.3 billion

Source of Wealth: Wal-Mart

Citizenship: USA

One of the heirs to the Wal-Mart empire, Alice Walton (daughter of Sam Walton), is one of the most generous in the family. She donated $1.7 billion to the Washington school system. With her own funds, she opened the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in the town of Bentonville, home of Wal-Mart, where she exhibits her collection worth hundreds of millions.

Robson Walton

Net worth: $26.1 billion

Source of Wealth: Wal-Mart

Citizenship: USA

Another heir to the Wal-Mart empire, Sam Walton's eldest son Robson Walton has served as chairman of the board of the Wal-Mart retail chain since 1992. The network currently has annual sales of $444 billion and employs 2.2 million people worldwide. Rob received more than $440 million in dividends last year, and he and his siblings have donated nearly $2 billion to the Walton Family Foundation over the past five years. Over the past year, his fortune grew by $3 billion, which allowed him to rise one step in the global ranking.

Karl Albrecht

Net worth: $26 billion

Source of wealth: Aldi

Nationality: Germany

Karl Albrecht owns the Aldi Sud discount chain, which includes 4,600 stores in 9 countries, including 1,200 stores in 32 US states. The company's revenue in 2012 grew by 9% to $46.5 billion.

Jeff Bezos

Net worth: $25.2 billion

Source of Wealth: Amazon.com

Citizenship: USA

Amazon's sales grew by $13 billion over the year, reaching $61 billion in 2012. The company's share price increased 40% last year, increasing Bezos' fortune by $6.8 billion.

Larry Page

Net worth: $23 billion

Source of Wealth: Google

Citizenship: USA

Google, co-founded by Larry Page, had revenues of more than $50 billion in 2012. The stock price rose 30%, adding $4 billion to Page's fortune. Lately, Page has been focusing the company's attention on mobile phones. It's "uncharted territory," he said. Page also promotes clean forms of energy and, together with fellow Google founder Sergey Brin, is an investor in electric car manufacturer Tesla Motors. And together with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, he is developing the idea of mining asteroids with robot ships.

Sergey Brin

Net worth: $22.8 billion

Source of Wealth: Google

Citizenship: USA

While Google co-founder Sergey Brin's partner Larry Page handles the company's operations, Brin, as Google's director of special projects, focuses on developing the company's new futuristic projects, such as augmented reality glasses and many others.

Mukesh Ambani

Net worth: $21.5 billion

Source of wealth: petrochemicals, oil, gas

Nationality: India

The fortune of India's richest man, the head of Reliance Industries, decreased by $1 billion over the past year. However, his Reliance Industries remains the country's most valuable company and, together with BP, is going to invest $5 billion in India's largest gas field.

Michele Ferrero

Net worth: $20.4 billion

Source of wealth: chocolate

Nationality: Italy

Michele Ferrero, aged 87, is the patriarch of the Italian chocolate dynasty Ferrero Group. He inherited the company from his father Pietro in 1950 and turned it into one of the world's largest confectionery concerns, owning brands such as Ferrero Rocher, Nutella and Tic Tac. Currently, the concern owns more than 70 subsidiaries around the world and 15 factories, with a total workforce of 22,000 people. Due to the successful promotion of Ferrero Group products in Russia, Brazil and the USA, the group’s income in 2011 increased by 9.1% to $9.6 billion, which increased the company’s value by $1.4 billion last year.

Lee Shau Kee

Net worth: $20.3 billion

Source of wealth: real estate

Nationality: Hong Kong

Henderson Land Chairman Lee Shau Kee increased his wealth by more than $2 billion last year as his property development company's share price soared, paralleling a surge in property prices in Hong Kong. Lee Shau Kee expects demand for property in Hong Kong to continue to rise despite government attempts to cool the market with higher property taxes on foreign buyers and mortgage restrictions.

David Thomson

Net worth: $20.3 billion

Source of wealth: Thomson Reuters

Nationality: Canada

David Thomson is at the head of a publishing empire that has been built over several generations. Together with his family, Thomson owns 55% of the media company Thomson Reuters, and also heads the Canadian daily newspaper The Globe and Mail. Together with his brother, rally driver Peter, he heads the holding company The Woodbridge Company Limited, which owns stakes in Thomson Reuters, analytics firm IHS, the Strategic Hotels and Resorts group and other companies. The Thompson family's fortune grew by nearly $3 billion last year as Thomson Reuters shares rose in value.

The richest people on the planet - 2013: Forbes ranking

Carlos Slim Helu

Bill Gates

Amancio Ortega

Warren Buffett

Larry Ellison

Charles Koch

David Koch

Lee Ka-Shin

Liliane Bettencourt and family

Bernard Arnault and family

Christy Walton and family

Stefan Persson

Michael Bloomberg

Jim Walton

Sheldon Adelson

Alice Walton

Robson Walton

Karl Albrecht

Jeff Bezos

Larry Page

Sergey Brin

Mukesh Ambani

Michele Ferrero

Lee Shau Kee

David Thomson