A Wall Street Journal blog reported that a Merrill Lynch survey showed that the world millionaires had fallen 15% from 2007 to 2008 and there were now 8.6 millionaires in the world. They defined a millionaire as someone who had $1m in investable assets. Those individuals saw their assets decline 20% in the year of their study.
The Super rich as defined as $30 million in investable assets had their ranks drop by 25% from 2007 to 2008 and the overall assets dropped 24%.
The Super wealthy consisted of less than 1% of the millionaire population although it had 34.6% of the millionaire assets.
The United States millionaire population lost less money than most countries falling 19%, the U.K. had a 26% drop, while Russia dropped 27%, India fell 32% and Australia and Canada both topped 23%.
Those least effected include Brazil, with a 9% drop, and China, with a 12% fall.
The US millionaire population is back at around 2004 levels.
