from the hip

Shipowner John Fredriksen is publicly acclaimed as Norway’s richest man.

John Fredriksen who built up his own wealth from nothing, continues to dominate the top of the list of the richest Norwegians. He now has a net worth reported to be NOK 55.5 billion (USD 10 billion) by the magazine Kapital.

Fredriksen is 63 years old and proud of hailing from a working class neighbourhood on Oslo’s east side. Through his investment companies Hemen Holdings and Meisha, Fredriksen controls the companies Frontline and Golar LNG from his £100 million Chelsea home in London. He also has major interests in the oil rig operator SeaDrill, the fish farming company Marine Harvest and the dry bulk company Golden Ocean Group. Fredriksen also recently announced that he through acquisitions and options and secured 9,6% of the worlds largest shipholding company Overseas Shipholding Group. (Source: Wikipedia).

When I say publicly acclaimed, the reason is that actually he is no longer a Norwegian citizen. He’s officially a citizen of Cyprus, after turning in his Norwegian passport in protest over Norway’s tax system.

However, Norwegian media as well as Norwegian politicians like to talk as if he was still Norwegian. For the politicians that may be a way to pretend that all is well and fine and, thus, avoid having to face challenges to the taxsystem that has recently driven both him and several others of the richest men in Norway out of the country, into tax exile.