Sunday Times Rich List: Exodus Of Foreign-Born Billionaires

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]So, the Gallagher brothers and billionaire donor to the Reform Party are among the new names that appear on this year's Sunday Times Rich List, which is published this morning. They have a combined wealth of 784 billion pounds, which is a 1.4% rise on last year. But the Sunday Times finds there's also an exodus of bu an exodus of billionaires. One in six who were on the list two years ago have vanished. Robert Watts compiles the list. It is a a thing that of miraculous quality. Robert, good morning.

[00:00:32]>> Morning, Callum. Morning, Rosie.

[00:00:34]>> Good morning.

[00:00:35]>> It's so good to speak to you, Robert.

[00:00:36]Let's start with the basics. How do you put this thing together? How do you get the info? How do you build the the sort of the list itself?

[00:00:43]>> Uh, this isn't jumping from one super yacht to the next. Most of what I do is a fairly um uh steady trudge through uh accounts filed at company's house, shareholdings and public companies, spending a lot of time looking at land registry documents, that kind of thing.

[00:00:57]But about between about a third and about a half of the people on the Sunday Times rich list talk to us um for for a number of reasons. We've been doing this a long time. This is our 38th year. So um a lot of the people on the list uh want to talk to us. They feel what we what the the richness is a matter of public record and uh they they don't want that number next to their name to be a surprise and we have to be very careful. Our readers deserve something that's reliable and uh accurately researched. We can't we can't be spun like any form of journalism. You've got to trust what people are telling you.

[00:01:28]But we do receive, you know, unparalleled access.

[00:01:32]>> It's amazing really. And it's it's as you say, it's been around for years and it's such an important part of history and the story of this country and actually the stories within this are are fascinating. Shall we start with some of the characters in the story first of all? So, we've mentioned a few of them.

[00:01:45]Who stands out for you, Robert?

[00:01:47]>> Oh, well, straight in at number six, Christopher Harborn. Um, someone who is I'd say a rich compiler's nightmare because um this is someone who's been sailing um sailing close beneath the radar for for many years. He's been in Thailand for nearly 30 years. He's built this international um global network of of businesses. But we know him all that.

[00:02:11]He suddenly leapt to prominence for the millions and millions of pounds he's given to reform and to Nigel Farage's party. Um, and the truth is a lot of his wealth simply cannot see, but we can see enough to put him at number six on the rich list with wealth of 18.2 billion pounds. So, what has he got? Well, we can see a stake in worth350 million pounds in Kinetic, a um defense contractor spun out of a Ministry of Defense that pays generous dividends.

[00:02:41]We've managed to find a a very quiet trading firm in the city of London called IFX, which uh employs a couple of couple of hundred people. That's uh 25 million more we can see there. Uh we found a private jet company in the uh in the United States that sells these um these lovely looking lovely looking jets. But the elephant in the room is this huge crypto trading um business worth well they think it's worth500 billion pounds for people running it. We we are much cons more conservative than that. We we think it's worth uh closer to 200 billion. Still a lot of money and Mr. Harbaugh owns 12% of that and that accounts for a lion share of his his wealth. But as I say, there's so much there we cannot see. So, who knows? He could be worth significantly more. But we on the rich list look at identifiable wealth. Wealth that we can prove. So, watch this space. He may go up next year.

[00:03:35]>> Well, indeed. And speaking of which, the two rich listeners who have increased their wealth the most over the past year were both born in Moscow.

[00:03:43]>> Yeah. Born within five years of each other. Um, Nick Sterky, the man behind Revolute. Have you heard about payments?

[00:03:51]Payments firm. It's the most valuable tech company in Europe, financial technology company in Europe based in London. And then Alex Gerko um a mathematician um behind the trading firm XTX. Now the sums that the the wealth has increased over the past year are staggering and 2025 million pounds a day if you look at it from an average basis.

[00:04:16]And it's important to say both both were Russian citizens. both had have denounced have denounced their Russian citizenship, dropped that, become British and crucially, it should be should be said, um condemned the war in Ukraine. But to be honest, they are exceptions really because um we are seeing this is a much more British list.

[00:04:38]The big trend we've seen is um over the past few year is these two exoduses of the global super rich who've come to London in recent years, come to the UK in recent years, they are leaving um in surprisingly large numbers. Um I mean what I found in excess of 60 billion pounds worth of wealth controlled by overseas billionaires, these people who have left. So Laxmi Mau the you know eight times he topped the Sunday Times rich list we don't feature him this year at all. Why he's not a British citizen and he's left the country. He's left um left Britain for Switzerland and uh and Dubai. Um and there are many many others. John Frederickson Christian I could go on on and on. Now that's one exodus but there's another exodus as well which is the homegrown British people. people who are now moving to Dubai, Switzerland, Monaco over Channel Islands and in fact this year more than 30% almost a third of the total wealth that 784 billion figure you you mentioned almost a third of that is now controlled by British people who don't live here.

[00:05:52]>> So which in itself is really interesting. So this kind of exodus of wealthy billionaires from overseas a and this crop of kind of new Britishbased billionaires is does one cancel out the other? I'm I'm trying to I'm trying to piece together, Robert, what this means for the sort of the economic picture of of the UK really. Well, what I think it what what I think it definitely means is that that this is a further problem for the public finances is that if you've got a if you've got a British entrepreneur who's who's left the UK and is paying themselves say dividends or they sell their business and that would incur a massive capital gains tax bill potentially, they're not they're not going to be chugging that money, paying that tax into the UK Treasury. One quick example, John Jake, an entrepreneur from Yorkshire who pays himself dividends of 50 million pounds a year. Now, if he was here in the UK in Yorkshire, he would be liable for um 40% up to up to 40% tax on those payments.

[00:06:59]So, significant sums, tens of millions of pounds going into the Treasury each year. He doesn't live here. He's in Monaco. So that those payments are not liable for for tax and a lot of these are places that are more attractive to the the global super to the to the British Britishbased Brits now to to move to somewhere like the Channel Islands. No inheritance tax, no capital gains tax, income tax at 20%. You can live there, you can still make your 9:00 meeting uh in in London if you uh if you jump on an early plane.

[00:07:31]>> Yeah.

[00:07:32]>> And talk to the Treasury about this.

[00:07:35]What do they say? Well, they say that, you know, it's it's right that that the wealthy, those with the broadest shoulders is the line that's often used, isn't it, from them, um, pay their fair share, and that London is still the capital of capitals and has a great attraction, um, was one of the lines they said to me. But in reality, uh, we don't know what the long-term implications of this. I spoke to Paul Johnson, that guy who Times columnist who used to run the IFS for nearly 15 years. He said it's plausible that you know a move like ending the non-dom status which which has left so many of the global super rich lead it's plausible that you'll raise more money in the early years um from from from that change but in the medium to long term we simply don't know.

[00:08:20]>> Okay. Uh Robert we love the Sunday Times rich list as you know and we're very glad to speak to you this morning. Thank you so much.

[00:08:26]>> Great to be here. That is Robert Watts who compiles the Sunday Times rich list which is published over the course of this weekend. So there's loads of articles to get stuck into. Make sure you've got your digital subscription up and running to dive into that at the times.com. Billionaires are abandoning Britain according to this year's Sunday Times rich list. One in six billionaires who were on the list two years ago have gone. So why is that? Let's speak to Susanna Streer, strategist at the investment firm Wealth Club. Morning Susanna.

[00:08:53]>> Good morning. Um, so then is this evidence of the super rich moving away from the UK? Because there is another part of the rich list which suggests that actually there's a growing number of billionaires from within Britain itself that this might be kind of foreign billionaires who have been here who are now leaving.

[00:09:10]>> Yeah. Well, actually the number of billionaires recorded on the list increase to 157 for the year, nudging up from 156 a year ago after there has been a period of decline. It's quite tricky.

[00:09:22]you got to dig right into the list. Uh but yes, some billionaires may be leaving, but clearly there are others who are more homegrown billionaires and millionaires in the UK moving up the rich list. And I don't think you could have uh not noticed all the coverage that have been of uh uh US wealthy Americans moving to the UK. The culturals in particular is a is a bit of a draw apparently. Even the handbags there are are selling like hot cake. So I think you know you've got an eb and flow put it that way of billionaires moving in and out of Britain.

[00:09:56]>> Yeah. What then of the argument that has been made for a couple of years that that it's easy for billionaires to up and leave. Is it is it what are the what are the processes involved? How quickly can somebody say I'm done with this country on to the next one?

[00:10:10]>> Well I think pretty quickly. Um one of the primary drivers that has been cited as the abolition of the nomon tax status. um and uh this concern that there could be, you know, a less attractive business environment. Uh but of course, you know, I think while high-profile departures do occur, I think perhaps this Exodus narrative is overstated certainly when it comes to the numbers, but it does seem as though they are highly mobile and can move around the world as they wish.

[00:10:41]>> How have billionaires been affected by policy changes in the last couple of years? what what what might be the kind of driving factors here?

[00:10:49]>> Well, yes, as I said, potentially u the abolition of the nomdom tax status in 2025 and higher taxes. So, some of the top destinations have been um recently uh places like Dubai, but again, as we've seen, there's also been an influx of of the wealthy from the Middle East because of the crisis. So I think as well and I talked about Americans u moving to the UK as well um depending on their political persuasion don't want to stay in the United States at the moment.

[00:11:21]So yes I mean you know I I think what we're seeing this is that it's not just one story in this rich lift because the number of billionaires has actually increased here in the UK. I was speaking to a wealthy person, that's all I'll say, not that long ago. And they kind of made a throwaway comment about uh years and years ago somebody they knew bought a house for a million pounds and they said that was when a million pounds was a million pounds. And I just wonder Susanna what that kind of economic um situation is for those who are super wealthy. Actually, is there is there still the same value for those who are super wealthy and perhaps billionaires, you know, are in a league of their own?

[00:11:57]But I mean on the way to getting there that that sort of flippant comment when a million pounds was a million pounds.

[00:12:02]Does that does that still hold true?

[00:12:04]>> Well, there's certainly more billionaires around and you're even talking about that there could be even trillionaires in the United States. Um it depends of course what sector and what business you're in just how rapidly um your wealth can grow and certainly if you're got your hands in AI and um all of the developments there we can see how quickly valuations have blown up. But equally um they can uh drop quite rapidly. Obviously the fear that there could be wealth taxes introduced um here in the UK if there were to be a change of prime minister or if uh there could be a change of government uh depending on what color that would be at the next uh parliament which political persuasion. Um that could uh cause a further exodus of uh uh billionaires from the UK. As I say, it's not just necessarily on wealth alone.

[00:12:58]>> Susanna, great to speak to you. Thanks very much indeed.

[00:13:01]>> That is Susanna Streer, a strategist at the investment firm Wealth Club.