Three millionths of a percent, that’s how many people throughout the world actually control the majority of the wealth.

According to a survey by Wealth-X (a Singapore based company that serves the interests of the ultra-rich, it says so on their web site) most of the world’s wealth is held by only 0.000003% of the people!

Ultra high net worth (UHNW) individuals are people with $30 million or more in assets.  That means real wealth, not wealth that’s ‘on paper’.  Wealth-X says there are only 185,795 UHNW people globally!  Of that, only 1,235 people are true billionaires!

Wealth-X breaks it down for the United States: 57,860 UHNWs, 455 of which are true billionaires. This means that of the 1% in the U.S., 1/54th controls 13.5% of the country’s wealth!

For Europe there are 54,325 UHNWs, in Asia there are 42,525 UHNWs, and 15,100 UHNWs in Latin America. Interestingly there’s nothing about ultra wealthy in Africa or the Middle East.

The Wealth-X survey is titled A Wealthy Head Count.