How Alice Walton Surpassed Rivals to Claim the Title of World’s Richest Woman

Before March, the richest woman in the world was Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, heir of the makeup company L’Oréal. Now that title goes to Alice Walton, the only daughter of Sam Walton (d. 1992), who was the founder of Walmart. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Alice Walton has a net worth of $138 billion. She is a primary stakeholder of Walton Enterprises alongside her siblings, although her brother, Jim C. Walton, is considered the family leader of the company. Alice Walton had maintained the top spot on the Forbes list of richest women in the United States, but now her wealth has surpassed that of the female billionaires in the entire world. 

Walmart Heir is the Richest Woman in the World

Walmart has been ranked the world’s largest retailer for over a decade, according to Fortune 500 rankings. However, the company’s shares have surged significantly in recent years, partially due to the increase of online commerce and the current economic climate. Walmart has made its name by offering affordable prices that are accessible to the average American. In fact, much of its earnings is from groceries alone.

Since January 2025, Walmart’s stock price has increased by 25.3%, with it now standing at $113.56, according to Zacks Investment Research. According to Walmart’s 2025 Annual Report, the retailer got 681 billion dollars in revenue, a 5.1% increase from last year. So Alice Walton’s increased wealth is hardly surprising. She doesn’t have an active role in running Walmart, although she briefly worked there in 1971 as a buyer of children’s clothes. Then she focused on finance and founded investment bank Llama Company in 1988, which closed ten years later.

Alice Walton has mainly devoted herself to becoming a patron of the arts. She owns a large art collection, including original pieces from famous artists such as Andy Warhol, Norman Rockwell, and Georgia O’Keeffe, according to Business Insider. In 2011, she chaired the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, to keep her $500 million private art collection. She is credited as a founder of the museum, although most of the $1.6 billion paid to open it came from trusts under the names of her late brother, John, and late mother, Helen. In 2014, she paid $44.4 million for one piece of artwork by Georgia O’Keeffe, which was the most expensive sale for art by a female artist. The work is now on display at the museum.

Art is for Everyone

The richest woman in the world is also a philanthropist. She has her own charity, the Alice L. Walton Foundation, whose mission is to make art accessible to everyone. It also collaborates to help provide quality education and healthcare to those who need it. The Alice L. Walton School of Medicine was founded in 2021. The organization also runs the nonprofit Heartland Whole Institute. In 2016, she donated 3.7 million of her Walmart shares (worth around $225 million) to her family’s nonprofit called the Walton Family Foundation. In 2017, the foundation gave $120 million to the University of Arkansas to set up a School of Art. 

She has also given money to Republican political candidates and action committees. However, in 2016, she supported Hillary Clinton and donated $353,400 to the Hillary Victory Fund. She has also devoted a lot of time to horse breeding, although she stepped back from it in 2015 to focus more on her art museum. 

Alice Walton purchased a two-floor condo on New York City’s Park Avenue for $25 million in 2014, and this location made headlines a year later when protests took place outside her building. At the time, people were demanding Walmart employees get better treatment, full-time work and $15 minimum wage, according to Vice. Many workers complained about erratic scheduling that excluded them from benefits and made it difficult to take a second job. 

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Walmart’s New Customer Base

In recent years, Walmart has improved its image and inventory to appeal to higher-income consumers. “​​I think it’s indicative of how Walmart is changing and how our customer base is changing,” said CFO John David Rainey at a New York retail industry conference earlier this month. “We continue to grow and gain share with this upper-income demographic.” Meanwhile, Walmart’s core customer base, those with lower- or middle-income, may struggle with purchasing necessities in this economy due to slowed wage growth, inflation, tariffs, and overall increased cost of living. Even those with higher incomes opt for discount retailers, especially for groceries. For example, Dollar Tree also experienced an influx of sales.

“It concerns me when I hear that affluent customers are shopping at lower-price retailers like Walmart and TJX because it’s a sign that things are getting expensive all around,” said shopping expert Trae Bodge to NBC News. “Obviously, if you’re more affluent, you can afford to buy the things you need. But if you’re seeking out lower prices, then where does the lower-cost consumer go?”

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