Mike Tyson earned 300-400 million dollars and blew it all in under 20 years. Granted, after taking in account taxes and fees for agents and managers I’m guessing he earned less than half that amount, but still that means he blew through 150-200 million dollars.
So what are the biggest fortunes that have been squandered?
Things I’m not talking about.
A company going under or failing. So if you invest 5 billion in a business that fails, I wouldn’t consider that the same thing. People who squander their money make bad decisions here and there on investments, but I’m not talking about things like Paul Allen losing $8 billion on telecommunications investments. However if Paul Allen had spent 8 billion on hookers, drugs, luxury items and stupid stuff, that would count.
A dictator being overthrown. Quadaffi had 200 billion hidden away and he lost it after he was overthrown.
I’m more asking whats the biggest amount of money people have blown on gambling, bad decisions, supporting family and friends, luxury spending, being ripped off, etc. There are multiple stories of athletes losing 50-400 million dollar fortunes in a decade or so, but I don’t know if fortunes bigger than that have been lost.
How about the heirs of King Mansa Musa of Mali? (or do they fall in your ‘overthrown’ category? – My understanding is that the fortune was mostly squandered.)
and things like the vanderbuilts where everyone the family knew or married was out to spend their money
I remember when Gloria vanderbuilt was making fashionable blue jeans and when asked on a talk show she said most of the kids and grandkids money was spent in payoffs divorces and lawyers fees and there wasn’t much left by the time she was of age to inherit
Her son cnns Anderson cooper said that she told him not to expect much if anything because it was just about gone which is one reason why he went into journalism
Evander Holyfield is another boxer that went bust and supposedly made as much as $560 Million during his career, now apparently worth $500,000, that’s pretty bad. I’m sure the huge house he had built was a bad idea, at one point it was the largest residential home in Atlanta, at 109 rooms and over 50,000 sq. feet. I think Rick Ross owns it now.
The net worth of dictators like Gaddafi are harder to pin down than normal super rich people. The assets of the country and the assets of the leader tend to be hard to separate.
A million barrels-ish a day at what? 50 USD/barrel? Anyway, this would be around 50 million dollars per day minus costs. About 18 billion USD a year. And we’re not counting natural gas exports. How much of that was he siphoning off, during his reign from the start of the Jamahiriya in 1977 until his death in 2011? 200 is probably pushing it, but I could see 100 billion USD.
Wonder where it all went?
EDIT: Compare with how ludicrously rich the royal family of Brunei is supposed to be, and they have average oil exports in the ~160,000 barrel a day range. Brunei Crude Oil: Exports, 1980 – 2024 | CEIC Data To be fair, I thought most of their energy exports were in natural gas, but 1/6 to 1/8th Libya’s production still lead to some staggering fortunes.
Very often, they don’t ever open their own bank records. They find out the money is gone when so’s the manager who’s taken a big chunk of it, including a big chunk of the amount he’s put them in the hock for.
There is an old saying from Yorkshire, England - “From clogs to clogs in three generations.” This is based on the idea that it takes one generation to found a business, the next to build it, and the third to spend it.
After WW", here in the UK, we had Lady Docker. She was from a modest background but managed to marry and outlive no less than three millionaires and worked hard to spend all their fortunes. I can’t find any estimate of how much she spent, but in today’s money, it must surely have been a £billion or two.
Terry Watanabe inherited a successful importing business from his father in 1977, and built it into a major direct mail retailer- The Oriental Trading Company. He sold it in 2007. At loose ends after a life of hard work, he tried gambling. He is now broke, having lost approximately $127,000,000.
Its called shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in 3 generations here. The argument is the first generation builds it, the second blows it and the third blows what little is left.
I knew a young couple who won just over 1 million dollars (before taxes) in a lottery, and were destitute in under two years. He purchased an expensive car immediately after winning, then hired a contractor to rush-build a garage for the car. But, they were renting the home and never spoke with their landlord about new construction on the property. They paid the contractor cash way above his bid on the job to get it built quickly so the car didn’t sit outside.
A short time later, the property owner discovered what had happened and there were legal issues with the fact that the garage was built without a permit. The landlord threw the couple out and they bought a very nice house. They spent lots of money on parties, where cocaine was always provided for all guests like something you’d see on Miami Vice. I attended one of the parties and was shocked/amazed/disturbed by their lifestyle.
When they ran out of money, the woman broke into her parent’s home (she was estranged from her folks) and stole valuables she knew they had. She was caught when she pawned the items and her parents wanted her prosecuted. I lost track of the couple at that point.