Sunday, December 14, 2008

Giants of finance


Warren Buffet: Warren Edward buffet was born in August 30, 1930 in Omaha, Nebraska. Buffet is the world most successful investor and now ranked as the world's richest person (as of February, 2008). He is the CEO of Berkshire Hathway and also the largest share holder of the same company.

His father was a stockbroker. At the age of six, he purchased 6- packs of Coca Cola from his grandmother store and resold it making a profit of five cents. While the other children of his age were busy playing, he was making money. He purchased his first share when he was just 11 and also makes a profit from that.

Benjamin Graham was his influential mentor. In his own word, he say "I'm 85 percent Benjamin Graham. Using capital of his family and friends he started a limited partnership in Omaha. It was a huge success. Later, Buffet wind up the partnership and invest in Berkshire Hathway. But it was not a great investment as the company was not doing well. But then Graham arrange two Nebraska insurance companies for Berkshire Hathway and gradually it became the leading provider of insurance. Under Buffet, Berkshire Hathway becomes an investment giant. Warren buffet is also known as "Oracle of Omaha.

Warren is now the world’s richest person with net worth $62.0 billion.


Carlos Slim HelĂș: Carlos Slim HelĂș was born in January 28, 1940 in Mexico City. He is an entrepreneur and businessman and now the world’s second richest man. His involvement in varied groups of companies like telecommunication, retail, banking and insurance, technology, and auto parts manufacturing diversify his way of profit. But his main focus was on the telecommunications industry.

The achievement of financial success of Slim Helu has been from finding undervalued companies and making them profitable. He acquired Telefonos de Mexico (Telmex) In 1990. In July, 2007 Mexican financial journalist Eduardo Garcia report him the wealthiest person of the world. Carlos was the first president of the Latin-America Committee of the New York Stock Exchange Administration Council.

"Technology is going to transform people's lives and society everywhere in the world. My main task is to understand what's going on and try to see where we can fit in."
Carlos Slim Helu

Carlos is now the world’s second richest person with net worth $60.0 billion.


Bill Gates: William Henry "Bill" Gates III, born in October 28, 1955 is an American and one of the richest man on the planet. He is the founder of the giant tech company, Microsoft. Gates is now ranked as the world's third richest person (as of February, 2008). For 15 consecutive years, he was the richest person in the world.

His father is an attorney of Seattle and his late mother served on the board of directors for First Interstate BancSystem and the United Way International. He started programming for computer at the age of thirteen. After completing graduation from Lakeside school in 1973, he got admission in Harvard University, where he meet Steve Ballmer (now chief executive officer of Microsoft). While pursuing graduation he wrote a version of programming language BASIC.

In 1975, Gates with his childhood friend Paul Allen, started his own office in Albuquerque to form Microsoft. There plan was to develop software for personal computers. On November 26, 1976, the trade name "Microsoft was registered. There company became famous for operating systems. Microsoft Windows operating system was launched on November 20, 1985.

Gates is now the world's third richest person with net worth $58.0 billion.


Lakshmi Mittal: Lakshmi Niwas Mittal is the president and CEO of Arcelor Mittal Steel Company and the fourth richest man in the world. This London based Industrialist was born On June 15, 1950 in Rajasthan, India.

He was born in a poor family of 20 members. His father moved to Kolkata and became a partner in a steel company. He graduated in 1969 from St.Xaviers College in Kolkata. He joined his family's steel making business in India and founded Mittal Steel Company in 1976.

Mittal split from his father and brothers in 1994 and went to make a global presence. He started from Indonesia and Trinidad and Tobago. Today he is the only global steel producer operating from 14 countries.

Lakshmi Mittal is now the world’s fourth richest person with net worth $45.0 billion.

2 comments:

Oskar schiffer said...

good one....

Anonymous said...

Wow - can you believe how much money some people have. great inspiration, and also wonderful brief profiles on these monetary leaders.