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Posts Tagged ‘Billionaire’

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A Jewish banker and philanthropist to Jewish causes has become Brazil’s richest person with $25.2 billion.

Joseph Safra, who is considered the richest banker in the world by Forbes magazine, has taken over the number one richest position in Brazil from entrepreneur Jorge Paulo Lemann, becoming the richest person in Latin America’s largest nation. The bank that bears his name announced in early February a net profit of near $2 billion in 2018, helping to increase his fortune.

Safra, 81, is a leading philanthropist in Brazil’s 120,000-strong Jewish community.  Born in Lebanon, he runs a Brazilian banking and investment empire. His Lebanese/Syrian family’s banking connections date back to Ottoman times. The Safras moved to Brazil in 1952.

Lemann, one of the partners in the 3G fund with a current fortune estimated at $23 billion, had been Brazil’s richest person for six years in a row, reported the G1 news website. He lost $ 4.4 billion between March 2018 and March 2019, moving down from from 20th to 37th place on the worldwide list. His fund 3G is behind companies such as Inbev, Burger King and Kraft Heinz.

During the same period, Safra’s banks’ worth increased by $1.6 billion, rising from 36th to 31st. The billionaires remain the only Brazilians in the top 100 of the world’s richest. Next on the list are Marcel Herrmann Telles (141st), also a partner in 3G, and Eduardo Saverin (153rd), co-founder of Facebook.

Source: JTA

 

According to a recent report on publicly announced giving compiled by The Chronicle of Philanthropy – an organization that publishes news and resources on philanthropy – there were twelve donations given by wealthy donors that surpassed $100 million, plus another six that totaled $100 million exactly.

The two largest donations – for $500 million each – came from Nike cofounder Phil Knight and his wife Penny, and investor-philanthropist Nicolas Beggruen.

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Phil Knight~

Knight, a billionaire whose net worth Forbes estimates at $24.9 billion (making him the 18th wealthiest person in the United States), made his high-value gift to the University of Oregon – his alma mater – to establish there a new center for scientific research. Berggruen, with an estimate worth of $1.73 billion, donated to his own public policy think-tank, the Berggruen Institute.

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Nicolas Berggruen~

The second most valuable donation, a $400 million pledge, was also made by Mr. and Mrs. Knight. This trove of charity went to Stanford University to establish the Knight-Hennessy Scholars Program, which provides education to 100 graduate high achieving students every year.

Also providing a $400 million gift to a good cause was physician Howard Marcus and wife Lottie, an investor, who directed their money in the form of a bequest to American Associates, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev for endowment and water research. The donation was the largest ever to an Israeli university.

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg made a large charitable impact, The billionaire’s philanthropic organization gave $360 million to handful of organizations and an additional $300 million donation to The Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health, to establish the Bloomberg American Health Initiative.

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Steven Cohen and wife Alexandra pledged $275 million last year to start the Cohen Veterans Network to provide mental-health services to former service members and their families. Cohen, whose net worth FORBES estimates at $13 billion, built his wealth in hedge funds.

Facebook founding president, Sean Parker, makes an appearance on the list of top donors of 2016, with a $250 million gift to establish the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.

Oracle founder, Larry Ellison, made the list as well, pledging $200 million to the University of Southern California, to establish the Lawrence J. Ellison Institute for Transformative Medicine.

Legendary investor and Berkshire Hathaway vice chairman Charlie Munger pledged $200 million to the University of California at Santa Barbara, for new student housing.

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Sanford Weill, chairman emeritus of Citigroup, and his wife, Joan, donated $185 million to the University of California at San Francisco, to start the Weill Institute for Neurosciences.

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg donated $107.2 million to the Fidelity Charitable, for the Sheryl Sandberg & Dave Goldberg Fund.

Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen pledged $100 million to establish the Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group.

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Billionaire Phillip Frost, a physician and pharmaceutical company executive, and his wife, Patricia, pledged $100 million to the University of Miami, to support applied sciences and engineering.

David Geffen, a cofounder of DreamWorks Studios SKG and founder of Geffen Records, pledged $100 million to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, to renovate and expand the museum.

Netflix founder, Reed Hastings, gave $100 million to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, to establish the Hastings Fund.

Robert King, founder of Peninsula Capital, and his wife, Dorothy, pledged $100 million to Stanford University, for scholarships for students from underdeveloped countries.

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Mortimer Zuckerman, a cofounder of Boston Properties, a real-estate investment trust, donated $100 million to create the Mortimer B. Zuckerman Scholars Program in STEM Leadership to bolster collaboration between top U.S. and Israeli researchers.

 

By Karsten Strauss