Eike is not the same person he once was: he fell from 7th to 100th richest.

247 – Eike Batista is no longer what he once was – and, judging by the negative variation in the shares of the EBX group companies, he is unlikely to return to that position anytime soon. Released today by Reuters, the list of the world's richest men compiled by Forbes magazine shows a drop of 93 positions for the Brazilian investor, who has gone from being the 7th richest man in the world, as he was ranked last year, to becoming 'only' the hundredth. He suffered an estimated loss of US$19,4 billion, the largest among the super-rich, due to the continued plummeting of his companies' shares on the Brazilian stock exchange. The top spot on the list, a position Eike promised to reach, remains held by Mexican Carlos Slim.

Below is a news article from Reuters regarding this:

By Patricia Reaney

NEW YORK, March 4 (Reuters) - Eike Batista plummeted from 7th to 100th place in the latest edition of Forbes magazine's list of billionaires, which continues to have Mexican Carlos Slim as the richest man in the world.

The Brazilian lost $19,4 billion – the biggest loss of the year – due to the devaluation of shares in his mining, energy, and shipbuilding companies. Eike's fortune was estimated by Forbes at $10,6 billion.

The highest-ranked Brazilian on the list is financier Jorge Paulo Lemann, in 33rd place, with a fortune of $17,8 billion. Lemann's investments include the food company Heinz, the fast-food chain Burger King, and Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world's largest brewery.

When the list was compiled on February 14, Mexican businessman Slim had an estimated fortune of $73 billion. But after that, shares of his company América Móvil fell sharply.

In second place on the list is American Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, with 67 billion dollars.

The big news in the top positions is Spaniard Amancio Ortega, co-founder of the Inditex group in the apparel sector. With an estimated net worth of $57 billion, he surpassed American Warren Buffett and Frenchman Bernard Arnault to take third place.

Ortega's fortune grew by $19,5 billion compared to the previous list -- the biggest jump among the world's billionaires, according to Forbes.

Buffett, chairman and CEO of the Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate, came in fourth place, with a net worth of $53,5 billion. This is the first time since 2000 that he has not appeared among the three richest people in the world.

"Warren had a great year, but Amancio Ortega had a better year," said Randall Lane, editor of Forbes. "He has one of the dominant clothing lines in Europe."

Arnault, from the luxury brand group LVMH, fell to tenth position, with 29 billion dollars.

Lane also commented that Slim's leadership, expanded this year, "is a statement that wealth is truly global, and not an American monopoly, as it sometimes seemed for decades."

The 73-year-old Mexican made much of his fortune in the telecommunications sector, but also operates in the retail, raw materials, finance, and energy sectors.

With the rise in US stock markets, partly thanks to monetary stimulus from the Fed (the US central bank), and with a strengthening of retail brands, many fortunes that were already on the list grew, and others reached the billion-dollar mark.

Forbes' list, in its 27th edition, is the largest ever, with 210 new billionaires.

"It's a very good year to become a billionaire, and a much easier year to become a billionaire. You have these economic forces and global markets growing, and that's pushing more people over the edge," Lane explained.

The combined net worth of the world's 1.426 billionaires, according to Forbes, reaches $5,4 trillion. In the previous list, it was $4,6 trillion.

Frenchwoman Liliane Bettencourt, of the L'Oreal cosmetics empire, is the richest woman in the world, ranking 9th on the list with $30 billion.

The world's youngest billionaire is internet entrepreneur Dustin Moskovitz, 28. The former roommate of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and one of the social network's early investors, ranked 353rd, with a fortune of $3,8 billion.