George W Bush top of TheRateTart Rich List
TheRateTart.com today published TheRateTart Rich List. Positions are awarded for blowing vast amounts of other people's cash:
1. George Dubya Bush - First by a long way. Dubya is the only US President to have earned an MBA before being elected. Nevertheless he's managed to turn a budget surplus of $284bn into a projected budget deficit of $296bn. This is the fourth largest of all time. The other three being presided over by, ahem, George W. Bush. The fifth? George Bush Senior. A family talent then.
2. Norman "Badger" Lamont - Not the biggest but still the leader for outright chutzpah. Despite promising not to, he withdrew the pound from the ERM on Black Wednesday, triggering economic chaos and wiping out an estimated £15bn. He goes down in history for singing in the bath in happiness afterwards. But he topped even that when he later said in a press conference "Je ne regrette rien".
3. Nick Leeson - The star derivatives trader who created 10% of Barings Bank's income in his early years. Leeson's unauthorised speculation lost the bank £827m and bankrupted his employers in the process. He hid his losses in a secret account numbered 88888, and fled after leaving a note saying "I'm sorry". You'd have thought that would be the end of it, but he was pursued and jailed. And now runs a football club.
4. Boo.com - the fast living clothes retailer went bust in 2000 after losing $120m during its brief existence. Living the .com dream? They invented it. Not all of the cash was wasted though. There were some pool tables left at the end.
5. Colin Pillinger – on behalf of the team behind Beagle 2. On December 19th 2003 the Beagle 2 Lander detached itself from the Mars Express, heading for the Red Planet. And was never heard from again. So that was £45m ploughed resolutely into the surface of Mars.
6. Terry Gilliam – the ex Python and world’s most unlucky film producer. His last effort alone cost investors £32m after flash floods washed the entire set away on day 2 of shooting.
7. Frank Abagnale Jr - immortalised in the Spielberg movie "Catch Me If You Can", Abagnale ran away from home as a teenager with just $25 dollars. In the course of a $4m cheque fraud, he passed himself off as a Pan Am pilot, a pediatrician, and an attorney. After a spell in jail, he became a consultant to the banks, helping them avoid fraud and is now a multi-millionaire. Again.
8. Kevin Federline - Fed-Ex's pre nup entitles him to a reported $300k plus half a Malibu house. Not shabby considering how he earned it.
9. Tony Wilson – the genius eccentric founder of Factory Records, and the man behind the Hacienda. He never signed contracts with his bands, and paid them about as frequently. Famously reported to have squandered £30k of the Happy Monday’s money on a board room table. Which they demolished.
10. George Best – admitted he "spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered”. Beautiful. But at the bottom of this list because it was his own cash.
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