Here’s what the Brexit did to South Africa’s richest people

·27 Jun 2016

According to billionaire data from Bloomberg, the world’s 400 richest people lost a combined $127.4 billion Friday, after Britain voted to exit the European Union.

South Africa’s two richest men, retail mogul, Christo Wiese, and diamond magnate, Nicky Oppenheimer, lost a combined $634.8 million due to the market fallout – the vast majority of which was lost by Wiese ($626.2 million).

The Bloomberg data is reflective of billionaire change in wealth from 24 June, 2016. Oppenheimer is listed as having lost ‘only’ $8.6 million.

According to Bloomberg, global billionaires lost 3.2% of their total net worth, bringing the combined sum to $3.9 trillion.

The biggest decline belonged to Europe’s richest person, Amancio Ortega, who lost more than $6 billion, while other big-name billionaires dropped more than $1 billion, including Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos.

South Africa’s biggest losers

Looking at Forbes’ ‘real time’ billionaire data, the picture continues to look bleak for South African billionaires.

The Forbes real-time data tracks the changes to billionaire wealth between trading days – in this case the difference between Friday 24 June and Monday 27 June.

The data shows that Wiese was again the overall loser in South Africa, having had $453 million of his wealth (6.9%) wiped off the map over the weekend.

Richemont chairman, Johann Rupert lost a whopping $168 million, while pharmaceutical executive Stephen Saad and mining and minerals exec Patrice Motsepe lost $39 million and $31 million, respectively.

South African billionaires – biggest Brexit losers (24 June – 27 June)

Billionaire	Net Worth	Change in US$	Change (%)
Christo Wiese	$6.2 billion	-$453 million	-6.9%
Johann Rupert	$5.0 billion	-$168 million	-3.2%
Stephen Saad	$1.3 billion	-$39 million	-2.9%
Patrice Motsepe	$1.3 billion	-$31 million	-2.3%
Koos Bekker	$1.7 billion	-$25 million	-1.5%
Nicky Oppenheimer	$6.6 billion	-$7 million	0.1%
Allan Gray	$1.7 billion	–	–