The cryptocurrency industry, pumping over $100 million in daily trading volume, brings more billionaires to the world’s economy each year.
The Business and Finance magazine Forbes, famous for publishing ‘The Worlds Richest,’ released “The Richest Crypto And Blockchain Billionaires in the World 2022.” The list includes 19 individuals who earned the most money from crypto in 2022.
On the top of the list stands the founder and the CEO of ‘Binance’ Changpeng Zhao (CZ) with a $65 billion net worth. He made his entire fortune in crypto in less than five years. The 44-years old businessman is also the 19th wealthiest person in the world.
Second and third are the two founders of global cryptocurrency exchanges. The CEO of ‘FTX’ Sam Bankman-Fried with $24 billion and the CEO of ‘Coinbase’ Brian Armstrong with a $6.6 billion net worth.
The new billionaires on the list: FTX co-founder and CTO Gary Wang ($5.6B), co-founders of blockchain company ‘Alchemy’ Nikil Viswanathan and Joseph Lau ($2.4B, each). This also includes the co-founders of the most popular NFT marketplace ‘OpenSea’ Devin Finzer and Alex Atallah ($2.2B, each).
Most of the billionaires are from the U.S. – except for CZ, who is Canadian; Song Chi-hyung (the founder of Upbit crypto exchange) and Kim Hyoung-nyon (co-founder of Dunamu, which operates Upbit), both are from South Korea.
The first time that Forbes released the wealthiest in crypto was back in 2018. CZ had an estimated worth of ‘merely’ $1.1-$2 billion, and the richest was the co-founder of ‘Ripple’ Chris Larsen, with an estimate of $7.5-$8 billion. Larsen is 5th on this year’s list, owning $4.3 billion.
To view the article and the full list, visit Forbes.
