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Top 40 Richest Women of 2019
Despite recent strides for gender equality, the pay gap between men and women has remained virtually the same for almost a decade. Women still don’t make nearly as much as men – but they are quickly catching up. And if you think all rich women are merely heiresses and widows, think again.
The women on this list make up the richest women in the entire world. Many of them started their own businesses, have been involved in politics, and dominate their respective industries. These women are powerhouses in their own right.
Each woman on the list is a businesswoman with tons of industry savvy. You’ll find women from all sectors of business, whether it’s cosmetic, commercial, food-related, oil and gas, or more. Without further ado, here are the world’s wealthiest women of 2019.
Laurene Powell Jobs
Country: USA
Company: Apple Inc., Disney
Net Worth: $18.8 Billion
Laurene Powell Jobs is an American businesswoman and philanthropist. She was born and raised in West Milford, New Jersey. She attended both the University of Pennsylvania and Stanford University, obtaining an MBA from the latter.
Laurene Powell married Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs. They remained married up until his death in 2011, for more than twenty years. Laurene now controls Apple, but she also has her own businesses going. She founded Emerson Collective and is also in charge of College Track.
Emerson Collective is a political activist organization lobbying for immigration and criminal justice reform. It also lobbies for a stronger educational system with better access to low-income students. College Track helps at-risk high schoolers apply for and attend college.
Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken
Country: UK
Company: Heineken
Net Worth: $12 Billion
Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken was born in Amsterdam, though she currently resides in London, England. She received her education from Rijnlands Lyceum Wassenaar, and her alma mater is the University of Leiden, from which she received a law degree. She is married to Michel de Carvalho and has five children.
Her nationality is Dutch and English, and she controls 25% of the brewery company Heineken International. Heineken International is the second-largest brewing company in the world (c’mon, of course you know Heineken!). She also served as the company’s executive director.
Her husband, Michel de Carvalho, is a well-known financier. He is the director of the financial institution Citigroup. The two met on a ski trip in Switzerland and were married soon thereafter, bringing their combined net worth even further into the billions.
J.K. Rowling
Country: UK
Company: Harry Potter franchise
Net Worth: $1 Billion
Oh c’mon, we all know the story by now, right? Once upon a time a young, single mother was just barely scraping by to make ends meet for her child. Her writing career was in the dumps, she was freshly divorced, clinically depressed and waiting tables for a living. Her name was J.K. Rowling.
But through the darkness, Rowling managed to scrape together enough hours to publish her first manuscript for a book called Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. The draft managed to sneak up the ranks of a major UK publisher, who saw the book’s potential. And the rest is history.
Rowling is today regarded as perhaps the only billionaire in history to make her fortune purely as a writer. The entire Harry Potter franchise – including all those toys, video games and movies – turned Rowling into the biggest rags-to-riches story in the world.
Yang Huiyan
Country: China
Company: Country Garden Holdings
Net Worth: $21.9 Billion
Yang Huiyan is a Chinese real estate titan. She also happens to be Asia’s richest woman. Her father was the majority shareholder of Country Garden Holdings, controlling 57% of the conglomerate. Her father transferred his shares to her, and Yang developed them even further, amassing a huge amount of wealth.
Yang is not even forty years old yet, and her fortune is in the double-digit billions. She was born in Shunde, which is located in the Guangdong Province of China. Her father Yang Gouqiang founded Country Garden Holdings in the 1990s. He transferred shares to her before the IPO twelve years ago.
Yang also attended the Ohio State University in America. She does fundraising for Country Garden Holdings, raising around $410 million for the company.
Pansy Ho
Country: Hong Kong
Company: MGM China
Net Worth: $6.4 Billion
Pansy Ho is from Macau. She has nationalities in both China (Hong Kong) and Canada. Her alma mater is Santa Clara University, and her billionaire businesswoman status came from her occupations in the casino and entertainment industry. She also received her primary education in Palo, Alto, California.
Her first career was in the Hong Kong media, where she was in a TV series called Breakthrough. She then opened a PR firm. She has business ties to the famous MGM Grand Casino. MGM Mirage has ties to Ho. Ho also works as the chairwoman of the Business Association of French Macau.
She received an honorary doctorate from Johnson & Wales in Rhode Island for business administration. She continues her work in the casino and entertainment industry both domestically and abroad.
Laiwa Chan
Country: China
Company: Fu Wah International Group
Net Worth: $6 Billion
Laiwa Chan is one of China’s richest and most inspiring women. She was born in Beijing, China. She was born in the Summer Palace to a family of noble Manchu birth, but her family collapsed into poverty after the fall of the Manchu Qing dynasty.
Chan rose from poverty, even though she had to drop out of high school. After scrapping together work as a furniture repairwoman, she launched a small furniture business in Hong Kong. The store became an instant hit, making her vastly wealthy. She was able to purchase twelve villas by the end of her biggest year!
That was the start of her massive real estate business. She is now the chairwoman of the Fuwah International Group. The Group expanded past real estate to also include sectors in many areas of industry.
Sheryl Sandberg
Country: USA
Company: Facebook
Net Worth: $1.6 Billion
Facebook’s current COO is billionaire Sheryl Sandberg. She graduated from Harvard Business School and immediately went to work for the U.S. Government during the Clinton administration. This then led to a successful stint at Google.
Her success caught the attention of Facebook co-founded Mark Zuckerberg, who was impressed and made her COO. Sandberg is largely credited for making Facebook profitable through hidden advertising.
However, Sandberg is also seen as one of the principal players in Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal – which saw millions of users’ private data sold to third-party companies without consent. This activity – along with her massive wealth – makes Sandberg one of the most powerful women in the entire world.
Oprah Winfrey
Country: USA
Company: Harpo Productions, The Oprah Winfrey Network
Net Worth: $2.5 Billion
The world’s most famous, iconic TV talk show host is also one of the richest women in the world. A true rags-to-riches story, Oprah Winfrey was born to an impoverished single mother in Mississippi. She entered media through the radio.
Oprah snagged a few appearances on TV before skyrocketing to fame for her debut film performance in Steven Spielberg’s The Color Purple. The role earned her an Oscar nomination. She soon debuted her own talk show, revolutionizing the format for all time.
She’s since used her incredible influence and wealth to spotlight social struggles all over the world. She has countless investments spanning media, real estate and publishing.
Susanne Klatten
Country: Germany
Company: BMW, Altana
Net Worth: $25 Billion
Susanne Klatten (née Quandt) was born in Bad Homburg, German in 1963. She is a German citizen, and she still resides there to this day. She is married to Jan Klatten, and the two have three children. She received her MBA from IMD-Lausanne, and she is considered Germany’s richest woman.
Klatten is the primary shareholder of Altana, a huge pharma and chemical manufacturer. She took 50.1% of her father’s shares and sat on the board, growing Altana into a huge corporation. Altana is on the German DAX registered for the top thirty companies.
Altana sold part of its business to Nycomed, but it still works in the specialty chemical production industry. Klatten also owns a 12.5% stake in the luxury carmaker BMW. She and her brother both sit on the board of BMW.
Miuccia Prada
Country: Italy
Company: Prada
Net Worth: $11.1 Billion
Miuccia Prada is head designer of world-renowned fashion label Prada. She is also the founder of the Prada subsidiary Miu Miu. She was born in Milan, Italy in 1949. She won the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s International Award in 1993.
Miuccia attended the University of Milan, from which she received both a PhD and BA. Her first major design that achieved success at Prada was a nylon, fine-woven handbag line. This took place in 1985. Four years later, she was able to establish the subsidiary brand Miu Miu.
Miu Miu is less expensive, but still counts as a luxury fashion brand. Miuccia expanded into the London and New York fashion weeks in the 1990s. Since then, Prada has transformed into one of the most recognized names in the fashion world.
Kylie Jenner
Country: USA
Company: Kylie Cosmetics
Net Worth: $1 Billion
Kylie Jenner – a young, standout member of the Jenner-Kardashian clan – first entered the public awareness as a co-star on the reality series Keepin Up with the Kardashians. Like other members of her family, she was able to parlay this fame into major dollar signs.
A string of endorsement deals and modeling contracts soon gave way to Jenner’s biggest business move: a cosmetics company, called simply Kylie Cosmetics. By the time of its launch, people were ready to buy it based on Kylie’s name (and Instagram account) alone.
The company transformed the young star into something even the other Jenner-Kardashians have failed to quite match: a billionaire businesswoman. The company tallies millions in sales every year, and continues to grow as Kylie expands the product line.
Holly Branson
Country: UK
Company: Virgin Group, Virgin Unite
Net Worth: $4 Billion
Billionaire Holly Branson is the daughter of legendary icon Richard Branson, who runs the multi-faceted Virgin empire. But despite inheriting billions from the beginning, there’s far more to Holly Branson than meets the eye.
Initially uninterested in her father’s business, young Branson set out to achieve her dream of becoming a doctor. Many years later she achieved this goal. She eventually used this experience when she eventually did join the Virgin company at her father’s insistence.
Branson has since been a tireless advocate for human rights and philanthropic causes all over the world, especially for the empowerment (and equality) of women. She personally spearheads most of Virgin’s nonprofit campaigns in impoverished countries.
Despite recent strides for gender equality, the pay gap between men and women has remained virtually the same for almost a decade. Women still don’t make nearly as much as men – but they are quickly catching up. And if you think all rich women are merely heiresses and widows, think again.
The women on this list make up the richest women in the entire world. Many of them started their own businesses, have been involved in politics, and dominate their respective industries. These women are powerhouses in their own right.
Each woman on the list is a businesswoman with tons of industry savvy. You’ll find women from all sectors of business, whether it’s cosmetic, commercial, food-related, oil and gas, or more. Without further ado, here are the world’s wealthiest women of 2019.
Laurene Powell Jobs
Country: USA
Company: Apple Inc., Disney
Net Worth: $18.8 Billion
Laurene Powell Jobs is an American businesswoman and philanthropist. She was born and raised in West Milford, New Jersey. She attended both the University of Pennsylvania and Stanford University, obtaining an MBA from the latter.
Laurene Powell married Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs. They remained married up until his death in 2011, for more than twenty years. Laurene now controls Apple, but she also has her own businesses going. She founded Emerson Collective and is also in charge of College Track.
Emerson Collective is a political activist organization lobbying for immigration and criminal justice reform. It also lobbies for a stronger educational system with better access to low-income students. College Track helps at-risk high schoolers apply for and attend college.
Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken
Country: UK
Company: Heineken
Net Worth: $12 Billion
Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken was born in Amsterdam, though she currently resides in London, England. She received her education from Rijnlands Lyceum Wassenaar, and her alma mater is the University of Leiden, from which she received a law degree. She is married to Michel de Carvalho and has five children.
Her nationality is Dutch and English, and she controls 25% of the brewery company Heineken International. Heineken International is the second-largest brewing company in the world (c’mon, of course you know Heineken!). She also served as the company’s executive director.
Her husband, Michel de Carvalho, is a well-known financier. He is the director of the financial institution Citigroup. The two met on a ski trip in Switzerland and were married soon thereafter, bringing their combined net worth even further into the billions.
J.K. Rowling
Country: UK
Company: Harry Potter franchise
Net Worth: $1 Billion
Oh c’mon, we all know the story by now, right? Once upon a time a young, single mother was just barely scraping by to make ends meet for her child. Her writing career was in the dumps, she was freshly divorced, clinically depressed and waiting tables for a living. Her name was J.K. Rowling.
But through the darkness, Rowling managed to scrape together enough hours to publish her first manuscript for a book called Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. The draft managed to sneak up the ranks of a major UK publisher, who saw the book’s potential. And the rest is history.
Rowling is today regarded as perhaps the only billionaire in history to make her fortune purely as a writer. The entire Harry Potter franchise – including all those toys, video games and movies – turned Rowling into the biggest rags-to-riches story in the world.
Yang Huiyan
Country: China
Company: Country Garden Holdings
Net Worth: $21.9 Billion
Yang Huiyan is a Chinese real estate titan. She also happens to be Asia’s richest woman. Her father was the majority shareholder of Country Garden Holdings, controlling 57% of the conglomerate. Her father transferred his shares to her, and Yang developed them even further, amassing a huge amount of wealth.
Yang is not even forty years old yet, and her fortune is in the double-digit billions. She was born in Shunde, which is located in the Guangdong Province of China. Her father Yang Gouqiang founded Country Garden Holdings in the 1990s. He transferred shares to her before the IPO twelve years ago.
Yang also attended the Ohio State University in America. She does fundraising for Country Garden Holdings, raising around $410 million for the company.
Pansy Ho
Country: Hong Kong
Company: MGM China
Net Worth: $6.4 Billion
Pansy Ho is from Macau. She has nationalities in both China (Hong Kong) and Canada. Her alma mater is Santa Clara University, and her billionaire businesswoman status came from her occupations in the casino and entertainment industry. She also received her primary education in Palo, Alto, California.
Her first career was in the Hong Kong media, where she was in a TV series called Breakthrough. She then opened a PR firm. She has business ties to the famous MGM Grand Casino. MGM Mirage has ties to Ho. Ho also works as the chairwoman of the Business Association of French Macau.
She received an honorary doctorate from Johnson & Wales in Rhode Island for business administration. She continues her work in the casino and entertainment industry both domestically and abroad.
Laiwa Chan
Country: China
Company: Fu Wah International Group
Net Worth: $6 Billion
Laiwa Chan is one of China’s richest and most inspiring women. She was born in Beijing, China. She was born in the Summer Palace to a family of noble Manchu birth, but her family collapsed into poverty after the fall of the Manchu Qing dynasty.
Chan rose from poverty, even though she had to drop out of high school. After scrapping together work as a furniture repairwoman, she launched a small furniture business in Hong Kong. The store became an instant hit, making her vastly wealthy. She was able to purchase twelve villas by the end of her biggest year!
That was the start of her massive real estate business. She is now the chairwoman of the Fuwah International Group. The Group expanded past real estate to also include sectors in many areas of industry.
Sheryl Sandberg
Country: USA
Company: Facebook
Net Worth: $1.6 Billion
Facebook’s current COO is billionaire Sheryl Sandberg. She graduated from Harvard Business School and immediately went to work for the U.S. Government during the Clinton administration. This then led to a successful stint at Google.
Her success caught the attention of Facebook co-founded Mark Zuckerberg, who was impressed and made her COO. Sandberg is largely credited for making Facebook profitable through hidden advertising.
However, Sandberg is also seen as one of the principal players in Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal – which saw millions of users’ private data sold to third-party companies without consent. This activity – along with her massive wealth – makes Sandberg one of the most powerful women in the entire world.
Oprah Winfrey
Country: USA
Company: Harpo Productions, The Oprah Winfrey Network
Net Worth: $2.5 Billion
The world’s most famous, iconic TV talk show host is also one of the richest women in the world. A true rags-to-riches story, Oprah Winfrey was born to an impoverished single mother in Mississippi. She entered media through the radio.
Oprah snagged a few appearances on TV before skyrocketing to fame for her debut film performance in Steven Spielberg’s The Color Purple. The role earned her an Oscar nomination. She soon debuted her own talk show, revolutionizing the format for all time.
She’s since used her incredible influence and wealth to spotlight social struggles all over the world. She has countless investments spanning media, real estate and publishing.
Susanne Klatten
Country: Germany
Company: BMW, Altana
Net Worth: $25 Billion
Susanne Klatten (née Quandt) was born in Bad Homburg, German in 1963. She is a German citizen, and she still resides there to this day. She is married to Jan Klatten, and the two have three children. She received her MBA from IMD-Lausanne, and she is considered Germany’s richest woman.
Klatten is the primary shareholder of Altana, a huge pharma and chemical manufacturer. She took 50.1% of her father’s shares and sat on the board, growing Altana into a huge corporation. Altana is on the German DAX registered for the top thirty companies.
Altana sold part of its business to Nycomed, but it still works in the specialty chemical production industry. Klatten also owns a 12.5% stake in the luxury carmaker BMW. She and her brother both sit on the board of BMW.
Miuccia Prada
Country: Italy
Company: Prada
Net Worth: $11.1 Billion
Miuccia Prada is head designer of world-renowned fashion label Prada. She is also the founder of the Prada subsidiary Miu Miu. She was born in Milan, Italy in 1949. She won the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s International Award in 1993.
Miuccia attended the University of Milan, from which she received both a PhD and BA. Her first major design that achieved success at Prada was a nylon, fine-woven handbag line. This took place in 1985. Four years later, she was able to establish the subsidiary brand Miu Miu.
Miu Miu is less expensive, but still counts as a luxury fashion brand. Miuccia expanded into the London and New York fashion weeks in the 1990s. Since then, Prada has transformed into one of the most recognized names in the fashion world.
Kylie Jenner
Country: USA
Company: Kylie Cosmetics
Net Worth: $1 Billion
Kylie Jenner – a young, standout member of the Jenner-Kardashian clan – first entered the public awareness as a co-star on the reality series Keepin Up with the Kardashians. Like other members of her family, she was able to parlay this fame into major dollar signs.
A string of endorsement deals and modeling contracts soon gave way to Jenner’s biggest business move: a cosmetics company, called simply Kylie Cosmetics. By the time of its launch, people were ready to buy it based on Kylie’s name (and Instagram account) alone.
The company transformed the young star into something even the other Jenner-Kardashians have failed to quite match: a billionaire businesswoman. The company tallies millions in sales every year, and continues to grow as Kylie expands the product line.
Holly Branson
Country: UK
Company: Virgin Group, Virgin Unite
Net Worth: $4 Billion
Billionaire Holly Branson is the daughter of legendary icon Richard Branson, who runs the multi-faceted Virgin empire. But despite inheriting billions from the beginning, there’s far more to Holly Branson than meets the eye.
Initially uninterested in her father’s business, young Branson set out to achieve her dream of becoming a doctor. Many years later she achieved this goal. She eventually used this experience when she eventually did join the Virgin company at her father’s insistence.
Branson has since been a tireless advocate for human rights and philanthropic causes all over the world, especially for the empowerment (and equality) of women. She personally spearheads most of Virgin’s nonprofit campaigns in impoverished countries.
