US financier Warren Buffett has overtaken Bill Gates as the world's richest man, according to the Forbes annual billionaire list, which this year saw Russia, China and India making increasing inroads.
Buffett, the 77-year-old chief of the Berkshire Hathaway holding company, saw his wealth jump from $52 billion last year to $62 billion, pushing Microsoft co-founder Gates into third position after 13 years at the top.
Mexico's telecom mogul Carlos Slim Helu grabbed second place with a tidy nest egg of $60 billion, up from $49 billion last year.
Five Irish businessmen also make the list. Sean Quinn and family come in at number 164 with an estimated fortune of $6 billion. He is followed by John Dorrance III, ranked 428 and with riches of $2.7 billion and Dermot Desmond who has €2.5 billion and is ranked at 462. Denis O'Brien, with a fortune of €2.2 billion is 553 in the list, while Anthony O'Reilly is placed at 677 with assets worth €1.8 billion.
US also made the Forbes Celebrity List, coming in at a rank of 22.
Buffett, who announced in 2006 he was giving the majority of his fortune to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, saw his wealth spike mostly due to the rising value of his Berkshire Hathaway stock.
'The amazing thing about Buffett going to the top of the list is that he did it at a time when he was giving away his money,' said Steve Forbes, the magazine's editor in chief.
In total, this year's list sees 1,125 people around the world making the billionaire's list, up from 946 last year. Their total net worth stands at $4.4 trillion, up from $3.5 trillion in 2007.
'This past year was an amazing one around the world in terms of the global economy and it's reflected on this list,' said Forbes, adding that the number of billionaires had almost doubled in the past four years. 'The reason for this explosion in wealth is that we're in the midst of a phenomenal global gloom,' he added.
By nationality, the Us still easily led the rankings with 469 billionaires up from 415 last year, but Russia replaced Germany as the second placed country with 87 billionaires.
Third-placed India saw the number of its super-rich jump to 53 entries on the list - four of them in the top 10 - although China and Hong Kong if taken together would overtake it, with 42 and 26 billionaires respectively.
Japan, although still the second largest economy in the world, saw its number of billionaires trailing at 24 - overtaken by Turkey, which this year saw its number of tycoons on the list jump from 22 in 2007 to 35.
Surprisingly, Buffett and Gates were the only Americans in the top 10, alongside one Mexican (second-placed Slim) four Indians (placed fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth), a Swede (seventh), a Russian (ninth) and a German (10th.)
Among the biggest losers were Starbucks chief Howard Schultz, whose stock dragged him off the list all together, and Spanish property billionaire Enrique Banuelos, whose wealth plunged from $7.7 billion in 2007 to $1.3 billion.
The average age fell by one year to 61, helped by an influx of younger Russians and Chinese, 50 of them under 40, while the number of women grew to 99, up from 87 last year, but only 10% of them were self-made.
The richest woman in the world was France's Liliane Bettencourt, of cosmetics company L'Oreal with a personal fortune of $22.9 billion, partly helped by the weak US dollar, which has fallen notably against the euro.
The fortunes were assessed as a snapshot on February 11, meaning that places on the list had likely changed since then, owing to fluctuations on the foreign exchange and stock markets.
