World's Richest People Lose $14 Billion

The world’s 200 wealthiest people lost $14 billion from their collective net worth this week as American employers took on more workers than forecast in May, helping the world’s largest economy weather the impact of higher taxes and federal spending cuts.

Hedge fund manager Steven Cohen slipped $500 million, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Cohen’s firm, SAC Capital Advisors LP, received billions of dollars in withdrawal requests this week, according to two people who saw the contents of a June 4 e-mail sent to employees by SAC President Tom Conheeney.

“We don’t like losing capital, but even with the investors that are leaving, we still have a stable capital base and have been performing well this year,” Conheeney said in the e-mail. Even if the firm ended this year with assets close to where it was four years ago, “we will still be a good-sized firm.”
 
SAC employees had expected that clients, who faced a June 3 redemption deadline, would take back most of the $4 billion they haven’t already marked for redemptions by early next year, people familiar with the firm said earlier this week. Investors are exiting as the U.S. government intensifies its probe of insider trading at the Stamford, Connecticut-based firm, once one of the best in the industry, with returns averaging 25 percent since 1992.

Cohen, 56, is ranked 119th on the index with a net worth of $9 billion. 

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) co-founder Bill Gates, 57, remains the richest person in the world, a title he recaptured three weeks ago. Gates’s fortune has risen $9.6 billion this year to $72.4 billion as shares of the world’s largest software maker have soared 34 percent.
 
Africa’s richestman,Nigeria’s AlikoDangote, is now 25th richestmanin the world. Forbes  said Dangoteis now the first African entrepreneur to lay claim to a $20 billion fortune.

Naij