Billionaire wealth has hit a new peak — and last year, the wealth of the world’s richest grew three times faster than ever before.
By November 2025, billionaires had accumulated $2.5 trillion more wealth than at the same time in 2024, enough to eradicate extreme poverty 26 times over, according to an analysis released by Oxfam International on Monday. It’s a surge that coincided with not just wealth, but power — with Oxfam reporting that today, billionaires are 4,000 times more likely to hold political office than the average person.
“This is happening in a world where 50% of people live in poverty, and one in four actually sleeps hungry,” Amitabh Behar, Oxfam’s executive director, told Devex during the World Economic Forum.
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About the author
Elissa Miolene
Elissa Miolene reports on USAID and the U.S. government at Devex. She previously covered education at The San Jose Mercury News, and has written for outlets like The Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, Washingtonian magazine, among others. Before shifting to journalism, Elissa led communications for humanitarian agencies in the United States, East Africa, and South Asia.
