In terms of the number of dollar billionaires, the Russian Federation is second only to China and the United States, and ranks first in the world in terms of property inequality.
In 2024, the total wealth owned by individuals in the richest countries in the world increased by 4.6% to $226.5 trillion, according to UBS calculations. The number of millionaires in the world increased by 1.2%. Russia was in third place in this indicator with an increase of almost 5%. Russia, along with Brazil, was also the leader in terms of inequality in the distribution of this wealth.
The Swiss bank UBS on June 18 released an annual report (until 2023 it was published by Credit Suisse) on the dynamics of world wealth – Global Wealth Report 2025. The total wealth of individuals in 2024 increased by 4.6% to $226.5 trillion. A year earlier it increased by 4.2%, and in 2022 decreased by 3%. In 2024, the number of dollar millionaires in the world increased by 1.2%, or 680 thousand, reaching almost 60 million people. UBS analysts predict that in the next five years – by 2029 – the number of millionaires in the world will grow by about 5 million more.
Global Wealth Report is published for the 16th time, earlier it was published by Credit Suisse bank, which was bought by UBS in 2023. The authors of the current report study data on the 56 richest countries, which account for 92% of the world’s wealth. The wealth in the report refers to financial and real assets (net of debts) owned by individuals.
The leader in the number of millionaires remains the United States – there are 23.8 million of them. They are followed by China (6.3 million millionaires), France (2.9 million), Japan (2.7 million) and Germany (almost 2.7 million). The strongest growth in the number of millionaires in 2024 was recorded in Turkey (by 8%) and the UAE (by 5.8%). In third place by this indicator Russia (growth of almost 5%), the number of dollar millionaires thus reached 426 thousand, which allowed to enter the top 20 countries in the world by this indicator.
UBS analysts note that the number of millionaires and their condition do not characterize the state of the economy as a whole.
“The growth in the number of dollar millionaires usually has its own logic: it does not have a strict link to the overall economic growth and sometimes it deviates strongly from the latter,” – says the report. In addition to data on the number of millionaires, the report gives the average and median level of wealth in different countries.
In terms of average wealth per inhabitant, the leaders are Switzerland ($687.2 thousand), the United States ($620.7 thousand) and Hong Kong ($601.2 thousand). In terms of median wealth (half of the population has more wealth, the other half has less), the top 3 are different: Luxembourg ($395.3 thousand), Australia ($268.4 thousand) and Belgium ($253.5 thousand). Russia is not included in the top 25 by any of these indicators.
UBS analysts also assess the level of inequality in the distribution of wealth within these 56 countries. The report ranks the countries according to the Gini coefficient – one of the main indicators of inequality (the higher the coefficient, the greater the inequality in the country). The leaders in terms of inequality were Brazil and Russia (Gini coefficient 0.82), followed by South Africa and the UAE (0.81), and Saudi Arabia (0.79). Comparatively low levels of inequality were recorded in Slovakia (0.38), Belgium and Qatar (0.47).
The authors of the report also note the uneven growth of wealth in different countries and regions. In particular, the share of wealth attributable to developing countries has hardly grown or even declined in recent years. Since 2017, it has been between 27% and 30% (never reaching that mark). Meanwhile, Eastern Europe turned out to be the region with the fastest growth in personal wealth, up 12% year-over-year. It was followed by North America (up almost 12%), the Middle East and Africa (up 4.2%). At the same time, in some regions there was a significant decrease: 4.3% in Latin America, about 1.5% in Western Europe, as well as in Australia and Oceania.