According to Wealth-X, the number of billionaires in the world rose slightly last year to 2,473.

The group did, however, suffer a setback:

Billionaires – defined as those individuals with a net worth of US$1 billion or above –controlled 3.9% of the world’s total household wealth in 2015, slightly down from 2014.

The race between the region that contains the United States and other areas tightened:

Despite the impressive growth of total billionaire wealth in 2015, not all regional groups, regions and countries faired equally. Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) have retained their position as the regional group with the most billionaires (1,013), while the Americas hold on to second place with 782 billionaires. Asia-Pacific is poised to eventually take over the Americas. With 678 billionaires, Asia-Pacific produced four times more billionaires than the Americas during 2015 and thus leads all regional groups in terms of growth rate of billionaire population and wealth, at 14.1% and 16.5% respectively. Not to be outdone, the Americas did overtake EMEA in total billionaire wealth, representing US$3.0 trillion, due to EMEA’s wealth declining by 0.8% year on year.

Finally, the disparity between men and women is not unlike that in the rest of the population:

Male billionaire over-representation increases:

• There are 17.5 times more men than women in net billionaire additions; 140 of the 148
  additions in 2015 were male.
• There are now 8.4 male billionaires for every female billionaire. This is up from a ratio
  of 8.1 to 1 in 2014.
• Wealth held by male billionaires also increased, now standing at 88.6% of total wealth, up
  from 87.2% in 2014.
• Male billionaires are becoming younger, more entrepreneurial and more likely to make an
  equitable distribution of their wealth through either divorce or death.
• The average age of male billionaires decreased by 0.6 years to 63.2 in 2015, while the age of
  female billionaires increased by 0.9 years to 62.2. 89.6% of all male billionaires source their
  fortunes from their own initiatives, versus 44.0% for females. Male billionaires divorced at
  a faster rate than their female counterparts, and the number of widowed female billionaires
  as a percentage of the population increased while the percentage of widowed males fell.

More evidence that women do not get treated fairly. Too bad.

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