It sounds unbelievable: the British hedge fund manager Christopher Hohn (54) already earned 1.5 million pounds a day this year, or 1.7 million CHF. In total, 657 million Swiss francs ended up in his account. According to the Guardian, this is probably the largest annual payment ever made in Britain.
The amount Hohn paid out of his Children’s Investment Fund was 15,000 times the average UK salary and 3,500 times the salary of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak (42). Hohn does not keep the many millions to himself. He would have reinvested the mega profit back into his funds.
Still, he doesn’t have to gnaw at the hunger pangs. The American magazine “Forbes” ranks him 259th on their worldwide list of the rich with an estimated fortune of $7.9 billion. Despite his billions, the Brit lives a “simple life” in his own words. All the money didn’t make him happier. But one more thing: helping other people!
“My life revolves around charity”
The reclusive billionaire is considered a philanthropist and has been supporting children in poorer countries for years. “My life revolves around charity,” he is quoted by The Guardian. He understood early on that he couldn’t take all that money with him. It is much more important to use the money to help others. “Money alone does not bring happiness.”
Hohn is regarded as one of the UK’s leading philanthropists and has donated more than 4.5 billion Swiss francs to his personal children’s charity. In recent years, he has also campaigned on the climate crisis and pledged to use the roughly CHF 32 billion fund to “force change on companies that refuse to take their environmental emissions seriously”.
Hohn had also received huge annual dividends in previous years. According to the Guardian, it was about 450 million francs in the financial year to February 2020 and 142 million francs in 2021. Critics are calling for higher taxes for mega-earners. Then much of the money would bolster ordinary workers’ incomes or fund vital public services, said Luke Hildyard of The High Pay Centre. (lrc)