They are Pierre Omidyar, an American and the founder of eBay, and Nasser Khalili, a British subject who made his fortune in real estate but is best known as a leading collector of Islamic art.
The list once included Omid Kordestani, the man who converted Google from an interesting idea into a profit-maker, and Manny Mashouf, owner of the Bebe women’s boutique stores. But they have not made the listing in recent years and are no longer rated as billionaires.
Men and women from 55 countries around the world made Forbes’ 2011 list of 1,210 
billionaires. But no Iranian resident in Iran made the list. It isn’t clear if that is because no Iranian is worth that much, or if Iran’s relative isolation from the international economy means that Iranian billionaires are hidden from view.
In the Islamic world, Turks clearly predominate on the wealth list—not Saudis. Eight Saudis make it onto Forbes’ list, but 30 Turks are on there.
Perhaps the most interesting revelation from the Islamic world is that six members of two Lebanese families are on the Forbes’ list—the Hariris and the Mikatis. Saad Hariri is the outgoing prime minister while Najib Mikati will succeed him in a few more weeks.
The billionaires’ list is headed by Carlos Slim Helu, a Mexican born in Mexico City to Lebanese parents. His money comes chiefly from telecoms.
At $74 billion in wealth, he is far ahead of #2 Bill gates of Microsoft with $56 billion in wealth and #3 Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway with $50 billion socked away.
Omidyar, 44, ranks 145th on the Forbes’ 2011 list with $6.7 billion in wealth, up from $5.2 billion last year. But five years ago, Forbes estimated Omidyar’s wealth at $7.7 billion. That makes the point this listing is highly sensitive to the vagaries of the stock market. For example, if Forbes had calculated Omidyar’s 2006 wealth in January instead of September, he would have shown up as worth $11.8 billion. Omidyar was born in France after his parents left Iran and before they moved to the United States.
Khalili is tied with dozens of others in last place with a measly $1 billion in wealth.
An interesting footnote is that David Rockefeller, bearing a name that is the epitome of established wealth, ranks only 488th on the list with a worth of $2.4 billion, little more than a third of Omidyar’s wealth.
Forbes is an American-based business magazine. It produces its list of the world’s billionaires annually.
