Four Colorado residents made the Forbes 400 List of the richest Americans this year despite a more expensive admission ticket into the elite club.
Surging technology fortunes, especially in semiconductors and artificial intelligence, raised the total wealth of the 400 richest Americans from $6.6 trillion a year ago to $8 trillion in this year’s ranking, .
Wealth has risen so much that 590 U.S. billionaires didn’t make the cut, including the only Colorado woman on last year’s list — Patricia Stryker of Fort Collins, whose grandfather built a long-lasting fortune selling medical equipment. Stryker, founder of the Bohemian Foundation, was on last year’s list with a net worth of $4.1 billion.
Philip Anschutz remains Colorado’s wealthiest resident with an estimated net worth of $19.3 billion, which ranked him the 60th highest in the U.S. and 143rd in the world. Anschutz built on early successes in oil and gas to purchase railroads, including the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad and Southern Pacific Railroad, and leveraged that investment to build a national fiber optic network, Qwest Communications.
Railroad ownership also opened the door to highly valuable land holdings in city centers. Anschutz Entertainment now owns more than 70 arena and concert venues around the globe, including Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.
A big soccer fan, Anschutz cofounded Major League Soccer. He has significant stakes in the LA Galaxy, as well as the city’s hockey franchise, the LA Kings. Closer to home, Anschutz owns the Broadmoor Hotel and the Gazette newspapers in Denver and Colorado Springs.
Anschutz’s holdings have benefited from a surge in the value of entertainment assets and sports franchises, driving a 78% increase in his net worth since 2023.
Charlie Ergen, founder and chairman of EchoStar, a satellite television and wireless company, has seen his wealth go on a wild ride this decade. Ergen amassed large amounts of wireless spectrum and for years rode high on Dish TV.
In 2017, Forbes pegged Ergen’s wealth at $18.3 billion, but by 2024 it has fallen to $1.4 billion, a 92% decline. That drop results from a feverish and capital-draining race by EchoStar to build a national cellular network from scratch. The network didn’t come together soon enough for federal regulators, who accused the company of squatting on valuable wireless capacity.
AT&T and SpaceX, owned by the country’s richest man, Elon Musk, stepped in to buy large chunks of the valuable spectrum, allowing EchoStar shares to recover. SpaceX, which briefly made Musk a trillionaire after its initial public offering before coming back to earth, also offered some of its shares in payment.
Ergen, at the 101st spot with a net worth of $12.8 billion, has essentially hitched a ride on the SpaceX rocket captained by Musk, who has a mind-boggling net worth of $908 billion.
Mark Stevens is Colorado’s third-wealthiest resident and ranks 120th overall with a net worth of $11.8 billion, largely accumulated through his role as a partner in the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, an early investor in tech hits like Google, PayPal and LinkedIn.
Stevens left Silicon Valley behind for a home base in Steamboat Springs in 2020, where he oversees S-Cube Capital, which was an early investor in graphics chip maker Nvidia, one of the big beneficiaries from the artificial intelligence boom.
Stevens has seen his net worth rise 228% since 2023, largely because of his Nvidia shares. Last year, he put some of his wealth to work in Steamboat Springs, where he purchased the newly constructed Riverview Apartment Complex for $95.3 million.
Initially intended as high-end, luxury housing, .
John Malone, Colorado’s cable cowboy, rounds out the list in the 134th spot with a net worth of $11.4 billion. The long-time chairman of Liberty Media, who built his fortune in cable and entertainment holdings, stepped down at the start of the year.
Malone was a telecom engineer who became an unrivaled financial engineer, disassembling and reassembling a vast array of holdings. Liberty Broadband, which owned a 25% interest in cable giant Charter Communications, was bought out by Charter on Aug. 20.
Malone has seen his wealth nearly double since 2020. He has invested heavily in land and conservation efforts over the year, and ranks as the country’s third-largest private landowner.
