The $100B Wall Street Empire
Michael Bloomberg holds one of the most unique fortunes in the world, consistently sitting above $100 billion. While most modern billionaires made their money selling phones, cars, or online shopping, Bloomberg built his empire on a tool that almost nobody outside the financial world ever touches: a computer system called the Bloomberg Terminal.
The Spend Michael Bloomberg Money Game puts that entire financial empire into your hands. Your challenge is simple: see how much of his fortune you can spend before your shopping cart runs out of things to buy.
Why Financial Traders Pay Him $30,000 a Year
The story of Bloomberg LP started with a major setback. In 1981, Michael Bloomberg was fired from the investment bank Salomon Brothers. He used his $10 million severance payout to start an innovative company that gave stock traders live price quotes, market news, and direct messaging on private dual-screen monitors.
Today, those black-and-amber screens sit on trading desks at every major bank, hedge fund, and central bank worldwide:
- Over 325,000 financial professionals pay roughly $30,000 every single year for their Bloomberg Terminal subscriptions.
- Because Bloomberg owns 88% of the company, that single subscription service brings in over $12 billion in revenue annually.
- The business has virtually zero long-term debt, turning Wall Street data into a personal money-making machine.
His Real-Life Spending: From $1 Mayor Salaries to $1B Campaigns
Michael Bloomberg is famous for spending money on a scale few people can imagine:
- The $1 Mayor: When he served as Mayor of New York City for 12 years (2002 to 2013), he refused his $2.7 million mayoral salary, accepting just $1 per year while regularly riding the Lexington Avenue subway to City Hall.
- The $1 Billion Campaign: In 2020, he spent over $1 billion of his own money in just over three months during his presidential primary run, funding television ads across all 50 states without accepting a single campaign donation.
- Historic Philanthropy: He gave a single $1.8 billion gift to Johns Hopkins University so low-income medical students could attend tuition-free, part of his more than $17 billion in lifetime giving.
- Luxury Real Estate & Aviation: He owns a collection of historic townhouses on Manhattan's Upper East Side, an 18th-century mansion in London, and personally pilots his own helicopters and private jets.
Can You Outspend New York City's Biggest Billionaire?
To understand the size of his wealth, Michael Bloomberg's personal fortune is larger than the entire annual budget of New York City, which funds all public schools, subways, firefighters, and police for over 8 million residents.
In this simulator, you can test how fast you can spend down this Wall Street fortune. Try buying commercial airline fleets, iconic landmark skyscrapers, and professional sports franchises to see if you can bring his balance down to zero dollars.