News story: Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of knuckle-barking (and Pavement inspiring) furniture store IKEA, has passed Bill Gates as the world’s richest man, at $53 billion vs. Bill’s estimated $47 billion, according to Swedish business weekly Veckans Affarer and Swedish television.
Note 1: The main culprit in Kamprad’s ascendancy was the dollar’s slide in value against other currencies. See Oliver Willis’s comments here.
Note 2: The company denies the claim, noting that Ingvar does not actually own the company: he donated it to a foundation 22 years ago.
Note 3: Scoble points out that writing about IKEA and Bill Gates brings lots of traffic. Heh.