FX.co ★ Top 10 Weirdest Purchases of Billionaires

Aquarium With Pickled Shark

Head of SAC Capital Advisors hedge fund Stephen Cohen opens our list with his collection of unique things, in particular, an unusual aquarium with a dead tiger shark. A five-meter-long predatory fish was caught in 1991 near Australia’s coast. British artist Damien Hirst turned it into an art object by preserving in formaldehyde in a vitrine. This exhibit has been a property of Charles Saatchi for a long time. In 2004, the shark started rotting as the formaldehyde was taking its toll on the corpse. It was purchased by Stephen Cohen and his wife Alexandra. Experts estimated the acquisition at $8-12 million. Later, the shark had to be replaced twice to a new one.

Richard Branson’s Spaceship

British entrepreneur Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group corporation, has a dream to establish regular tourist flights into space. First, he plans to travel beyond the atmosphere himself. The billionaire has already sold about 1,000 tickets. Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Ashton Kutcher are among his potential space tourists. In the meantime, any client can feel weightless for several minutes during a flight on a suborbital spacecraft for $250 thousand.

Pornstar Assistant

In 2015, an anonymous Chinese citizen hired Rola Misaki (Takizawa), a porn actress of Russian-Japanese descent, to be his personal assistant for 15 years. The amount of contract is said to be $7.5 million. Meanwhile, the man was seen at several social events, but his face was always hidden behind a mask.

Titanic Replica

Not every billionaire would be satisfied with having a yacht, even if it’s the largest in the world. For instance, Australian businessman and politician Clive Palmer got the idea to build a replica of the Titanic which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in 1912. The construction has been stopped several times due to financial issues, but it is resumed at the moment. The nine-story liner will be restored including its historic interiors. However, the security requirements of the new Titanic were increased compared to its original version. The hull will be assembled from welded sheets of metal instead of stitched ones. The first two-week cruise is scheduled for 2022. The vessel will travel from Singapore to Dubai, and then to Southampton.

10,000 Year Clock of Jeff Bezos

The founder and head of Amazon is cherishing an idea to build a mechanical clock that could work for 10 thousand years without winding. This project cost the billionaire $42 million. The clock will be installed near Van Horn, Western Texas. This 150-meter chronometer will not count seconds, minutes, or hours. Instead, its bells will play a new melody every year. Bezos aims to make people think more often about the planet’s future and to practice long-term planning.

Personal Skyscraper

Mukesh Ambani, India’s oil tycoon and the richest man in Asia, has built the most expensive house in the world. The co-founder of Reliance Industries placed his family in a 27-story skyscraper with the Arabian Sea view in Mumbai. The cost of this skyscraper is estimated at $1-2 billion. The building has nine elevators, three helipads, a car service, parking occupying six floors, several pools, a SPA salon, a theater, a ballroom for receptions, and hanging gardens. There could be twice as many floors, however, the owner chose to make high ceilings. Ambani hired 600 people to keep his 170-meter tower in order.

James Cameron’s Bathyscaphe

James Cameron, the winner of three Oscars for the film "Titanic", always wanted to visit the deepest point of the World Ocean. In 2012, he made his dream come true and became the first man who went down to the bottom of the Mariana trench alone. He spent about 3 hours at a depth of 11,000 meters. In order to achieve his goal, the producer had to design and build his own single bathyscaphe Deepsea Challenger with 3D-cameras, light systems, and mechanical arms for collecting soil. It took 7 years and $7 million.

Autograph Seen From Space

Sheikh Hamad bin Hamdan Al Nahyan, a billionaire from the United Arab Emirates, put his autograph on the Al Futaisi island. Besides, he owns the island as well. Dozens of workers from Pakistan and Bangladesh turned the first letters into drainage trenches to make sure they were not washed away by waves. The billionaire is also known as the Rainbow Sheikh. He got this nickname for his personal collection of cars which became the basis for the Emirate National Automobile Museum (ENAM).

The Largest and Most Expensive Yacht in the World

Eclipse is the world’s most expensive yacht owned by Russian businessman Roman Abramovich. The megayacht was created jointly by the German company Blohm+Voss and Atabeyki Design Development, while the interiors were designed by British specialists from Terence Disdale Design.

Experts estimate the cost of the 162-meter vessel at $1.2 billion. The yacht has a concert hall, three dining rooms, 24 luxury cabins, a cinema, a wine cellar, and two swimming pools. Besides, the list of equipment includes such things as a submarine, helicopters, and boats.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Notebook

In 1994, Bill Gates bought the Codex Leicester of Leonardo da Vinci, an Italian artist and scientist. The billionaire paid $30.8 million for this manuscript written in the early 16th century. There are over 300 drawings, diagrams, mathematical calculations, and scientific records on 72 pages of the notebook. For example, there are da Vinci’s reflections about why the moon is shining. All notes are written from right to left, so one can read them only using a mirror. Sometimes Bill Gates allows various museums to show the manuscript at their exhibitions.