Jacob Rothschild death sparks resurgence of misinformation on family dynasty

Rob LEVER, AFP USA Published on 29 February 2024 at 17:15

The death of banking scion Jacob Rothschild in February 2024 has led to a resurgence of misinformation about the family, including claims that it controls central banks and the global economy with trillions of dollars in wealth. But the world's central banks are largely owned by governments, not private investors -- and the Rothschilds do not appear on lists of the world's wealthiest individuals and families.

"The rothschilds were behind the fed, and they now control the global financial system," says a February 26, 2024 Instagram post with more than 30,000 likes.

Text in an image of the late financier on Facebook says: "My name is Jacob Rothschild. My family is worth 500 trillion dollars ... We own your news, the media, your oil and your government."

Similar claims circulated elsewhere on Instagram, Facebook and X. Some include anti-Semitic memes or a debunked theory that Jacob Rothschild was the inspiration for the evil industrialist Mr Burns on "The Simpsons."

Screenshot of an Instagram post taken February 28, 2024

The Rothschild family has been involved in banking since the 18th century and grew to become one of the world's wealthiest in that era (archived here).

But claims of control over central banks and trillions in assets are false -- the latest in a series of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories targeting the dynasty.

Trillions?

The claim of $500 trillion in wealth is implausible. A report from Swiss bank UBS estimated total private wealth worldwide was around $454 billion at the end of 2022 (archived here).

The main banking company with which Jacob Rothschild was affiliated was UK-based Rothschild & Co, whose market capitalization was roughly $3 billion in late February 2024 (archived here).

Another company tied to the family is the Swiss-based financial firm Edmond de Rothschild, with a market value of some $1.3 billion (archived here).

There is a wide range of estimates of the family's net worth, most without detailed sources. None are in the range suggested in the social media posts:

The Sunday Times' list of the wealthiest people in Britain estimates the Rothschild family's net worth was around £825 million in 2023, or just over $1 billion (archived here).
No Rothschilds appear on Bloomberg's lists of the world's richest people and families (archived here and here). The former is headed by Elon Musk with $213 billion as of February 28, while the latter is led by the ruling Al Nahyan family of the United Arab Emirates with some $300 billion.
Forbes's Real-Time Billionaires List (archived here) paints a similar picture, with France's Bernard Arnault slightly ahead of Musk with $230 billion. One person on the list named Jeff Rothschild, with an estimated worth of $5.7 billion, is not related to the banking family, according to the magazine.

Central bank ownership?

AFP has previously debunked claims that the Rothschilds and other wealthy individuals own the Federal Reserve, the US central bank.

Congress created the independent agency, with regional Fed banks set up as public-private entities. They are required to turn over profits from lending operations to the Treasury.

Most of the world's central banks are state-owned, with a handful having some private investors, according to an October 2019 blog post from the Bank of England (archived here).

The Bank of Japan, for example, requires 55 percent state ownership. The European Central Bank, meanwhile, is owned by the central banks of EU member states. AFP in 2020 debunked claims that the Rothschilds owned the Bank of France.

AFP found no mention of central bank investments on the websites of Rothschild & Co or Edmond de Rothschild.

Evil banker?

Lead Stories, an independent fact-checking outlet, in November 2021 debunked a long-running claim that Jacob Rothschild was the inspiration for the Mr Burns character on the animated series "The Simpsons."

The website cited a 2000 TV Guide interview with creator Matt Groening, who told the magazine the character was a "combination of real-life oil tycoon John D Rockefeller and Lionel Barrymore's loathsome Henry Potter character in 'It's a Wonderful Life,'" the popular 1946 film.

Snopes, another fact-checking organization, reported that in another interview, Groening mentioned Rockefeller, Howard Hughes, the fictional Charles Foster Kane and one of his high school teachers named Mr Bailey.

AFP has previously fact-checked claims that the Rothschild family owns major global news organizations.