10 of the Coolest People in Finance

Thinking about a career in the financial industry or business world spurs images of men in suits, talking on their mobile phones or taking meetings all day. However, there’s quite a number of well-known people who are way cooler than your regular businessman. Here are some of them:

1. Elon Musk

Elon Musk isn’t being dubbed the real-life Tony Stark aka Iron Man for nothing, as he is known to venture into the most forward-thinking ideas in technology. For one, he is the founder of SpaceX, which is a California-based company that develops and manufactures space launch vehicles, focused on advancing the state of rocket technology.

Not only that, but Musk is also the CEO of Tesla Motors, which manufactures luxury electric cars. He also provided the concept and initial capital for SolarCity, which is the second largest provider of solar systems in the United States. To top it off, Musk is also the brains behind Hyperloop, which is the concept for a high-speed transportation system incorporating reduced-pressure tubes.

2. Richard Branson

Another cool dude in the world of finance is Sir Richard Branson who was actually knighted in Buckhingham Palace for his services to entrepreneurship. After all, he has the Virgin Brand into being an industry giant in various sectors such as air travel, music production, mobile communications, and even space transportation.

Apart from all that, Branson is also a renowned philanthropist and venture capitalist. He became known for his campaigns in environmental awareness, but he is probably most popular for his world record attempts to travel around the world on a balloon and speedboat. He is also a huge fan of Star Trek and has named his spaceship VSS Enterprise.

3. Mark Cuban

Mark Cuban is an American businessman and investor, made popular by his appearances in the TV show Shark Tank and his ownership of the Dallas Mavericks. One of his first business ventures was a company called MicroSolutions, which was a systems integrator and software reseller. He was also involved in the entertainment industry with Broadcast.com (formerly Audionet), eventually becoming the chairman of HDTV cable network AXS TV.

Cuban has made a lot of investments in technology startups and has spearheaded ventures in the social software and distributed networking industries. During the 2008 recession, he created a website to monitor the use of the US government’s $700 billion bailout funds.

4. Fred Ehrsam

A well-known figure in the cryptocurrency industry, Fred Ehrsam is the co-founder of Coinbase, which is one of the largest digital currency exchanges in the world. It was created in 2012, years after bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto shared his concept for the cryptocurrency and the blockchain protocol, and received a $25 million investment from the greats in the bitcoin world.

Since then, the exchange has continued to boom and incorporate more digital assets such as ethereum and has rebranded itself as the Global Digital Asset Exchange, outliving the first-movers in the bitcoin industry such as Mt. Gox.

5. Sean Parker

To many, Sean Parker is just the founder of the now-defunct Napster, an online music sharing portal, and is the villain in the Facebook story, as portrayed in the movie The Social Network. But not a lot of people know that Parker has carried on with his entrepreneurial ventures since the 90s and has even become involved in philanthropy as well.

As of November 2015, his estimated net worth is around $2.5 billion. He is also the founder and chairman of Parker Foundation, which is involved in life sciences, global public health, and civic engagement. Parker has also launched Plaxo, invested $15 million in Spotify, and became advisor to The People’s Operator, which is a mobile network provider that donates 10% of its profits to charity.

6. David Karp

At the age of 30, David Karp is the youngest magnate in this list, being the founder of short-blogging platform Tumblr. His net worth exceeds $200 million and Tumblr is valued at $800 million. In 2013, it was announced that Yahoo! would acquire Tumblr for $1.1 billion but Karp has remained CEO of the company.

Throughout the years, Karp has made investments in companies such as Superpedestrian, Copenhagen Wheel, and Sherpaa.

7. Bill Gates

Of course this list wouldn’t be complete without one of the earlier cool dudes in the business world himself, Bill Gates. As many know, he is the co-founder of Microsoft and is the wealthiest person in the world with a net worth of $76.4 billion.

Gates is known for his numerous charitable donations and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which was listed as the world’s wealthiest charitable foundation. He is also known as the world’s youngest self-made billionaire.

8. Larry Ellison

Larry Ellison is the co-founder and CEO of Oracle Corporation, a database management software company. He is ranked as the third wealthiest person in the US and the fifth in the world with a net worth of $56.2 billion.

What makes Ellison cool is his success in yachting through Oracle Team USA and his love for flying, being a licensed aircraft pilot with two military jets. He has been married and divorced four times.

9. Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos is considered one of the forefathers of e-commerce, being the founder and CEO of Amazon.com. He has other business ventures in newspapers and aerospace, as he is the founder and owner of the privately-funded aerospace developer Blue Origin.

Blue Origin has tested flights to space starting last year and has plans for commercial suborbital human space flight by 2018. Bezos was also one of the first few investors in Google, investing $250,000 to the company in 1998.

10. Michael Bloomberg

Almost everyone in finance has heard of the Bloomberg Terminal, which was invented by business magnate and later on New York mayor Michael Bloomberg. He has held office for three consecutive terms and is the sixth wealthiest person in the United States. Rumor has it that Bloomberg only got a one dollar salary as mayor of New York, getting most of his funds from the revenues of the Bloomberg Terminal.

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