The 3 Richest Guys in Nevada

According to Forbes 25th edition of the 400 Richest Americans list, one billion dollars was not worthy of admittance to the anniversary publication. It’s actually up by $300 million from last year to a whopping $1.3 billion. The combined net worth of our wealthiest citizens amounts to $1.54 trillion. Can anyone actually count that high? When we consider riches and treasure, we are bound to picture the glamorous and glitzy, Las Vegas, right? Two of the three richest guys in Nevada are casino-owners, but you’ll never guess how the third guys made his fortune.

The infamous #3 on the Forbes 400 list is Sheldon Adelson, whose net worth is $20.5 billion. Bet you wish you could be on his holiday shopping list! Mr. Adelson is a self made billionaire and owner of the Las Vegas Sands. Currently he is age 73 and married with 5 children. He’s an Education City College of New York dropout. Wow! This rich guy reeks of “Rich Dad Poor Dad”. The son of a Boston cabdriver, his business of hosting tradeshows for the computer industry hooked him the beginning of his huge fortune. He changed the way Las Vegas does business by landing convention contracts for the mid-week down times in good ol’ Sin City. He’s not the least bit intimidated by being the new guy on the block, as will be the case in Asia, now that he has won the coveted Singapore gaming license.

#86 on the Forbes 400 list is none other than the impressive Stephen A. Wynn. His net worth is upwards of $3.9 billion – nothing to laugh at. We all know Mr. Wynn as the developer of the fabulous Vegas Wynn Resort hotels. At age 64, he has a wife and 2 children. He has a Bachelor of Arts/Science from University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Wynn is another self made entrepreneur, starting out life as the son of a bingo parlor operator. He later bought the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas and followed up with the construction of the Mirage, Treasure Island and Bellagio theme resorts. He sold the Mirage resorts but last month unveiled the $1.2 billion Wynn Macau casino. He is of course, the arch nemesis of Sheldon Adelson.

Pierre M. Omidyar is #34 by Forbes’ standards and has a net worth of $7.7 billion. Lucky “sevens” it is for this self made business tycoon but he didn’t do it with a casino like the other 2 rich guys. He is the creator of nothing less than the glorified online auction, Ebay. Mr. Omidyar graduated from Tufts University with a Bachelor of Arts/Science. He is currently age 39 and married with 3 children. Omidyar is a French-born immigrant and after launching Ebay in 1995, he was able to keep it afloat during the disastrous Internet bubble bust by taking good care of his online trading community.  This tycoon of tech has an interest in the online classifieds, “Craigslist”, and owns Skype, the international web-phone company with billions of online users. You go Pierre! 

You can check out the rest of the Forbes 400 Richest Americans list on Forbes.com.