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Like most nomads, Nicolas Berggruen travels light.

He doesn't own a house, car or even a watch and the few belongings he does have are carried around in a paper bag.

Possessions have 'zero appeal', he says. It's our actions that have real value.

But what sets the 50-year-old apart from nearly all other homeless people is the small matter of his ÂĢ1.5billion fortune.

 

Berggruen got rid of his New York pad and private island 12 years ago. Home is far more transient nowadays.

Life for him is a jet-set one - trotting the globe, hanging out with beautiful women and staying in luxury hotels, sometimes in 14 different cities in a month as he builds his enormous business empire.

His most recent acquisition has been a ÂĢ881million stake in Burger King.

But in spite of his wealth, the Franco-German tycoon insists he doesn't need, or want, material goods.

 

'Possessing things is not interesting,' he told the Daily Mirror. 'Living in grand environments to show myself and others that I have wealth has zero appeal.

'Whatever I own is temporary, since we're only here for a short period of time. It's our actions that will last for ever. That's real value.'

Berggruen was born into a privileged family (his Jewish father, Heinz, was a wealthy art dealer who befriended Pablo Picasso) in Paris in 1961.

He had a rebellious streak when growing up - getting expelled for 'insubordination' from a Swiss boarding school and once vowing he wouldn't learn 'a word of English' because it was the language of imperialism.

He did, however, move away from that view and went on to study finance at university in New York.

 



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...h.html#ixzz1rO3wfyfC

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Originally Posted by Sunil:

He doesn't own a house, car or even a watch and the few belongings he does have are carried around in a paper bag.....getting expelled for 'insubordination' from a Swiss boarding school ....... ..........even down to getting kicked out of lil ABC....scary!

FM
Last edited by Former Member

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