Of the 1,645 billionaires in the world, 85 are German. The highest placed German is the 94-year-old supermarket king Karl Albrecht, valued at $25 billion.
Karl Albrecht and his late brother Theo took over their mother’s corner grocery store in Essen in 1946 and turned it into a heavyweight, with low prices and no frills.
Albrecht is followed on the list by Dieter Schwarz, owner of Lidl and Kaufland. His wealth has increased from $19.5 billion to $21.1 billion over the last year.
There were five Germans in the global top 50 and of the top ten richest Germans just two were women.
See the list of Germany's ten richest billionaires here
Germany’s youngest billionaire is 29-year-old Anton Kathrein Jr with a fortune of $1.35 billion. He inherited his family TV antenna business.
He is closely followed as the youngest, but surpassed in wealth, by Albert von Thurn und Taxis, the 12th prince in his family line.
The 30-year-old, valued at $1.6 billion, inherited his fortune on his 18th birthday. The Edinburgh University graduate owns 36,000 hectares of woods in Germany.
The billionaires on the Forbes list have a combined wealth of $6.4 trillion with Bill Gates ranked number one.
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