5. The last of the Russian monarchy, presiding over the fall of the Romanov dynasty, Nicholas II nevertheless accrued a peak personal fortune of approximately $300,000,000,000.
Nicholas II, also known as Nicholas the Bloody, was the last Emperor of Russia, reigning from 1894 until his forced abdication in 1917. Born in 1868, his father, Alexander III, failed to prepare his son for the throne, believing that he had decades longer to introduce Nicholas to governing. Inexpert and untrained, the reign of Nicholas II was fraught with political and military turmoil. Losing the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, during which the Russian Baltic Fleet was embarrassingly destroyed, Nicholas was forced to violently suppress the 1905 Russian Revolution. Entering World War One, Russia’s performance remained dire.
Losing an estimated 3.3 million Russian soldiers, Nicholas was held personally responsible. After the February Revolution of 1917, Nicholas was compelled to abdicate on behalf of the entire House of Romanov and was taken into custody. Following the October Revolution, which brought the Bolsheviks to power, the imprisoned royal family were executed in July 1918. Despite an ignoble end, Nicholas II, through his capacity as Emperor of All Russia, amassed a vast personal wealth prior to his downfall. Modern estimates place his fortune in 1916 in the vicinity of three hundred billion in 2018 terms.