Hacker News Reader

Comment by exclusiv | Hacker News Reader

Putin's is unknown. An advisor said 70B in 2012 [1] Where do you see Xi having comparable substantial wealth? I see 500M to 1.5B.

Where do you get small fraction? That's not true at all. I can't even see either of your examples as having more, let alone a multiple.

Anyway, the wealthiest western capitalists aren't even accounted for. "author Malcolm Gladwell estimated the value of Rockefeller's fortune at its peak, in today's dollars, at $318.3 billion" [2] It's divided among the family at this point though of course.

But of the living individuals that we know (Bezos/Gates/Musk/Zuck), and have accurate info for, your statement is not true.

[1] https://money.com/vladimir-putin-net-worth/

[2] https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/how-rich-is-the-rockefel...

View on HN

Why on earth would Xi allow his wealth to be known? The media in China isn’t even allowed to cover basic actions of the CCP. But China is a country run by bribes and guanxi. And all bribes flow up. It is possible he has decided to not accept the payments, but very unlikely.

That's precisely my point. We only have some very limited data available. And none of that says anywhere near 200B or multiples of that as you present as a fact.

2015 estimate for Putin was $200b[1] by Bill Browder, who for a period of time, had been mistakenly believed to manage Vlad's wealth, and was active in the privatization investment opportunities in Russia.

In 2015, the richest western capitalist was Gates with $80b[2], which means Putin was worth 2.5x more than Gates.

Another example of how these kleptocracies tend to funnel wealth up into the top is Kadafi, who was estimated to have died with $200b stashed around the world[3]. At that time, Bill Gates was worth $61b[4].

Without proof, I grant that you can believe whatever you want about Xi. But you can believe he's a unique benevolent snowflake in the history of totalitarians, or you can believe he's just like the rest. I'm going to assume he's like the rest and wait for proof that shows the opposite.

[1] https://cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com/2015/02/15/putins-net-wor...

[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2015/03/02/forbes-...

[3] https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-xpm-2011-oct-21-la-fg-kada...

[4] https://www.forbes.com/sites/luisakroll/2012/03/07/forbes-wo...

Putin had $200 billion in 2017 if you believe this senate testimony. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/31/financier-bill-browder-says-...

That's an estimate by someone with insight, but not like they were the bookkeeper for Putin. And if true, that's still inline with the top western capitalists (which we have real data for). Not multiples of their wealth. That's ridiculous to assume and present as fact.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com