Domain Magnate

A Chinese investment fund manager won the chance to have lunch with billionaire Warren Buffett by bidding 2.1 million dollars (£1.05m) in the most expensive charity auction ever held on eBay.

Zhao Danyang of the Hong Kong-based Pureheart China Growth Investment Fund won the auction, which ended Friday evening with a bid of 2,110,100 dollars.

A spokeswoman for the Glide Foundation, which receives all the proceeds from the auction, identified the winner yesterday.

It appears that Zhao and Buffett share a similar investment philosophy.

The auction will provide a significant boost to Glide, which provides social services to the poor and homeless in San Francisco. The foundation operates on a 12 million dollar (£6m) annual budget, spokeswoman Denise Lamott said.

“It almost feels like a miracle,” Glide’s founder Reverend Cecil Williams said in a statement. “We are amazed and ready to continue our work of breaking the cycles of poverty.”

Last year’s lunch brought in 650,100 dollars (£325,000). read more »

Forbes.com just released a new billionaires list and Bill Gates is only #3 with $58.0 billions!

Top two positions are taken by Warren Buffett and Carlos Slim Helu & family with 62 and 60 bln respectively.

See the full list here

It’s interesting to note that among top 8 billionaires there are 4 Indians and only 2 Americans. Roman Abramovich, the owner of London Chelsea, is no longer the richest man in Russia, Oleg Deripaska is #9, who is also the youngest in the top 25. Google founders Sergey and Larry are down to positions 32 and 33.

According to Forbes there are currently 1062 billionaires in the world.