One trillion dollars (£718bn) is an almost incomprehensible sum of money – in fact, in single dollar bills it would weigh 1.1 million tonnes and would fill up more than 44,000 18-wheel trucks, according to the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. So what could possibly be worth that amount of cash? Click or scroll through to find out.
In 2007, energy company PetroChina became the first business in the world to reach a $1 trillion valuation, after its floatation on the Shanghai Stock Exchange almost tripled its value. The glory was short-lived, however, as only a couple of hours later an investment bank said the stock was overvalued, and shares fell by 11%. Within 20 weeks the share price had fallen by 52%. China’s largest oil and natural gas producer is now worth a much more modest ¥774.23 billion ($119.1bn/£86.1bn) as of 16 March.
Apple became the first US company to reach a $1 trillion valuation in 2018, but then saw its value fall below $800 billion (£581.8bn) later in the year. Unlike PetroChina, Apple made a swift recovery – and then some. The tech giant hit a new milestone in August last year when it became the first US company to be valued at $2 trillion (£1.4tn). Apple is currently worth $2.08 trillion (£1.5tn), as of 16 March.
Exactly one month after Apple hit $1 trillion, so did e-commerce behemoth Amazon. The online retailer also felt the impact of the wilting US stock market towards the end of 2018, but had rejoined the $1 trillion club by January 2020. Amazon is currently valued at $1.55 trillion (£1.12tn), as of 16 March. If his wealth continues to grow at its current rate, founder Jeff Bezos could be the world’s first trillionaire by 2026, according to analysis by business platform Comparisun. Bezos is currently worth $180.9 billion (£130.7bn), according to Forbes, which already makes him the richest person on the planet.
Microsoft stole the crown of the world’s most valuable company towards the end of 2018 and then became a $1 trillion business for the first time in April 2019. Fuelled by increasing digitalisation as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, Microsoft’s value has escalated rapidly and currently sits at $1.77 trillion (£1.27tn), as of 16 March.
The parent company of Google, Alphabet is the most recent US company to have joined the $1 trillion club after it hit the four-comma figure in January 2020. Google’s continuing success has been attributed to its strong core advertising business, money-spinner acquisitions such as YouTube, and its expansion into a diverse range of projects, including self-driving cars, medical tech and renewable energy. Alphabet has a value of $1.39 trillion (£998bn) as of 16 March.
Apple may have been the first US company to hit the $2 trillion (£1.4tn) milestone, but oil producer Saudi Aramco was the first company overall to get there eight months earlier in December 2018. Earlier that month it had had the biggest initial public offering in history when it was valued at $1.7 trillion (£1.2tn), but its value continued to swell to $2 trillion (£1.4tn). The COVID-19 outbreak caused oil prices to tumble and today Saudi Aramco is valued at 126.02 billion riyals ($33.6bn/£24.3bn) as of 16 March.
Sticking with Saudi Arabia, the richest family in the world is the House of Saud, the royal institution that has ruled the kingdom since 1744. The family comprises around 15,000 members who split a fortune of more than $1.4 trillion (£1tn). Other monarchies don’t even come close to the wealth of this ruling clan, and the House of Saud has more money than the next five wealthiest royal families combined.
Discover the other richest royal families in the world
From trillion-dollar people to cities full of affluent individuals. New York City is the richest city in the world in terms of the private wealth held by its inhabitants, which amounts to $3 trillion (£2.15tn), according to New World Wealth. As of October 2019, 65 billionaires and more than 380,000 millionaires resided in the Big Apple. The other cities whose inhabitants are also worth $1 trillion (£718bn) or more are Tokyo, San Francisco Bay area, London, Beijing, Shanghai, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Sydney and Singapore.
Putting a price on tangible assets such as property comes with its challenges, but the most recent concept to have a $1 trillion market value is bitcoin – a cryptocurrency that is entirely virtual. The price of bitcoin is very volatile, and increased adoption by major investors and companies, including Tesla founder Elon Musk and the Bank of New York Mellon, has recently caused its value to soar. Bitcoin reached a record high of $59,755 (£36.7k) per coin on 13 March, pushing its market value to more than $1 trillion (£718bn).
Incredibly the value of real estate in a country can exceed its GDP by quite a margin, and while China has the second largest economy in the world, the value of its residential and commercial real estate hit $52 trillion (£37.6tn) in 2019, according to Goldman Sachs Group. This includes all houses in the country as well as the business premises, such as hotels, public facilities and stores.
With the world’s most prosperous cities hitting the $1 trillion mark, it’s unsurprising that plenty of countries fall into the same category. The United States rules supreme as the wealthiest country in the world with an overall wealth of $114.9 trillion (£83tn) as of 2019, according to Credit Suisse's 2020 Global Wealth Report. America is home to the most members of the world's 1%, and 39% of the world's millionaires. In comparison, China has a wealth of $78 trillion (£56.4tn) while the UK has a wealth of $14.6 trillion (£10.6tn).
And finally, to a substance with a value that's truly out of this world. In 2011, a rocky planet around twice the size of Earth was detected orbiting a star in the Cancer constellation. A year later it was discovered that 55 Cancri e – since dubbed ‘the Diamond Planet’ – has a surface of graphite, which surrounds a thick layer of diamonds. The exoplanet’s dense carbon make-up, combined with a temperature of around 2,150°C (3,900°F) creates the perfect conditions for producing the glitzy stone. The value of this mass of diamonds has been estimated at $26.9 nonillion (£19.3 nonillion), which is $26.9 followed by 30 zeros. To put this incredible sum into context, the Earth’s GDP is approximately $87.8 trillion (£63.5tn) as of 2019, and the Diamond Planet is believed to be worth 306 quadrillion times that amount.
Now see how much money you need to be in different countries' richest 1% of people