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Gates wrongly dethroned
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April 27, 2001: 7:42 p.m. ET
British paper incorrectly honors Walton of Wal-Mart as world's wealthiest man
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Billionaire Bill Gates of Microsoft Corp. was wrongly demoted last weekend by Britain's Sunday Times, according to a financial news magazine article.
The London-based newspaper reported that Gates had lost his crown to Wal-Mart Chairman Sam Robson Walton as the world's wealthiest man, but the paper was off by a whopping $48 billion, according to Forbes.
The magazine said the super discount store's proxy reveals that the 1.7 billion Wal-Mart (WMT: up $1.59 to $52.83, Research, Estimates) shares were owned collectively by its founder Sam Walton Sr.'s widow and their four children. Therefore, the total amount of approximately $87 billion should be split evenly amongst the five of them, and each would only own $17 billion.
According to Forbes' most recent calculations, Gates is still worth roughly $59 billion, down from $63 billion in September of 2000 due to the shrinking stock price of Microsoft (MSFT: down $2.01 to $67.12, Research, Estimates)
The magazine article pointed out that the London newspaper, however, buries an explanation – "denotes family wealth" – on the bottom of a table that accompanies the article.
The retail empire started from a single shop in Rogers, Arkansas, by Sam Walton Sr. in 1962, and now Wal-Mart boasts more than 4,000 outlets worldwide.
- from staff and wire reports 
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