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Companies and Billionaires

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Re: Companies and Billionaires

#71
post #66
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Short answer to your question is "Private Banking": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_banking You have a specific account manager, who you know, and is in communication with you about that Jet purchase. Yes, it probably is a wire, but maybe to an escrow, depending.

You do not need to go the private banking way to have such level of service. I am living in Germany at the moment, I have an account in a Sparkasse (A savings bank). As I needed to buy a car, I informed my account manager that I would buy one, gave her the bank account information of the car dealer and told her that if everything is in order, I would call and ask her to perform an "instant" money transfer. Just went…

Well, I'm sure a bank has enough cash on its own accounts to pay for a car instantly. My parents had a problem few years ago when they were buying a warehouse for big $$$, and the bank literally asked them to wait a couple days until they could gather that much money to actually pay out the loan. Now imagine that times hundred - I guess it's not a simple operation.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somewhat related, if you or someone else knows: is there any special process for transferring or handling large amounts of money? For example, if you're buying a $5m private jet, how would you pay for it? A regular check or bank transfer? Also, do the banks keep any security checks in place? e.g. If I had $10m and there was a request to transfer out $5m, I'd definitely like the bank to run it by me.

at the $millions level, although technically you could, you generally don't "send money" like you or i or even a typical rich person would do as individuals paying a regular bill. you talk to a person at the bank who calls up another person at another bank, and they wire the money from bank to bank or some kind of intermediary, like an underwriter or escrow co. think of it like financing a new car purchase, on a gran…

>>think of it like financing a new car purchase, on a grand scale. how many people were involved in a $30k car transaction? you, your SO, maybe your kids, the sales guy, the sales manager, the finance manager, the underwriter at the bank, the underwriter's manager at the bank, etc. sure you wrote the dealership a check for the down payment, but did you "send" anyone $30k?

I'm not disagreeing with you, but I recently bought a car for much more than $30k, and I just paid using my chip-and-pin debit card at the dealership - so yeah, I guess the dealership got a transfer directly from Visa.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#73
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might be able to move around when you incur income tax a little bit that way, but you can't avoid it.

This is exactly right, you can shift it into another tax year but you can't legally avoid it. But everyone's tax situation is different.

There are ways, e.g. by donating to your own accredited charitable foundation.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#74
post #49

I think most people don't realize just how much money the richest people have. People generally think of normal(ish) distributions like height, where if you're 10% taller or shorter than average, you're a tall or short person, and 40% taller makes you the tallest person in the world. In comparison, wealth has a very, very long tail, making it hard to visualize. Here's what I've come up with to visualize wealth. Suppo…

Exponential cumulative distribution. Mostly because wealth of the few on the top I'd made by accumulation of wealth of the ones below. A mathematical description of exploitation.

One of the "problems" of capitalism. Excessive capital accumulation past a certain point. What makes the system great, is also one of its fatal flaws.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#76
post #55
post #51

In 20-30 years, Zuckerberg is going to be in a league of his own.

My money is on Bezos to take the #1 spot and stay there for decades.

Unless Musk cracks open the asteroid mining industry with SpaceX! (Though Bezos IS best-positioned to compete with Blue Horizon)

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#77
post #55
post #51

In 20-30 years, Zuckerberg is going to be in a league of his own.

My money is on Bezos to take the #1 spot and stay there for decades.

My comment was more related to the ages of everyone else on that list rather than the reasons behind their fortunes.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly right, you can shift it into another tax year but you can't legally avoid it. But everyone's tax situation is different.

There are ways, e.g. by donating to your own accredited charitable foundation.

But then you can only use the money for certain purposes.

Re: Companies and Billionaires

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are ways, e.g. by donating to your own accredited charitable foundation.

But then you can only use the money for certain purposes.

Of course, you can't get rid of your entire tax bill (well, maybe you can, in one tax year). But you can probably do more with charities than you'd assume.

For example: let's say you buy a mansion. This mansion has a forest or large amounts of land surrounding it. A charity focusing on land or nature preservation could acquire that land.

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