MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Mexican among the world's four richest men

A Mexican figures among the four richest men in the world according to the latest edition of the annual United States Forbes magazine ranking.

Carlos Slim ranks with a fortune or 23,8 billion US dollars, an incredible 70% increase over the previous year.

Top of the list are Bill Gates with 46,5 billion US dollars, Warren Buffet 44 billion and in third place Lakshmi Mittal from India with 25 billion.

Latinamerica figures with 26 names in the list of the richest in the world, which last year saw their assets balloon because of greater world economic activity, the appreciation of commodities and a weaker US currency.

The global value of Latinamerican fortunes increased from 69,8 billion in 2003 to 87,9 billion in 2004.

The second richest Latinamericans are Brazilian brothers Joseph and Moise Safra who rank 91 in the world. They are followed by Venezuelan communication tycoon Gustavo Cisneros, 5 billion; Chilean businessman Andronico Luksic with 4,2 billion and Lorenzo Mendoza, Venezuela 4,1 billion US dollars.

Other Chilean billionaires include Anacleto Angelini, 2,9 billion and Eliodoro Matte and family, 2,7 billion US dollars.

Forbes finally indicates that the US has the greatest number of new entries in the richest ranking list with 69 new faces followed by Russia with nine, United Kingdom, eight and Germany seven.