Featured Image Credit: Chris Reynolds/NBC
Topics: Money
Jess Battison
I don’t know about you but I’ve had dreams about opening my bank account to see I’ve been paid an extra chunk of cash on top of my salary.
Or perhaps you’ve dreamt of winning a bit of money on the lottery or maybe that you’ve managed to sell all your old stuff online. But imagine checking your banking app to find you’ve got a whopping £70 quadrillion just sitting there. I’d be on the floor to be honest.
And yet there’s one regular bloke who doesn’t need to imagine it after he became the richest person of all time for two minutes.
Yep, for two minutes over a decade ago, Chris Reynolds earned himself that title.
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The pretty mad situation unfolded back in July 2013 when he opened up his PayPal to suddenly find a 17-figure sum sitting with the money he expected to see in there.
This mega balance meant the man officially overtook Mexican business magnate Carlos Slim as the richest person in the world at the time, when Slim had a net worth of $67 billion.
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Before this unexpected credit appeared, Reynolds said the most he’d ever made on PayPal was a ‘little over $1,000 (£765)’, which he’d made after selling a set of vintage BMW tyres on eBay.
Chatting about his sudden wealth with the Philadelphia Daily News, the man said the huge sum made him feel ‘like a million bucks’ – I think you mean ‘like a quadrillion bucks’ mate.
"At first I thought that I owed quadrillions,” he said. "It was quite a big surprise."
If he’d kept the money, Reynolds had big plans to ‘pay the national debt down’ and then 'buy the Phillies', referring to the Philadelphia baseball team.
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Playing it smart though, that would only be if he could 'get a great price' for the team.
Unfortunately however, Reynolds’ sudden mega bucks were stripped away almost as fast as it arrived when PayPal realised what had happened and apologized to him for the 'inconvenience'.
Although, I’m not sure I’d class becoming the richest person in the world as the biggest ‘inconvenience’. In a statement, the company said: "This is obviously an error and we appreciate that Mr. Reynolds understood this was the case.”
The money was withdrawn from his account but the company offered to donate an undisclosed amount of cash to a charity of his choice.
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"We think it's inspiring that he decided to use this occurrence to donate to a cause he believes in," Paypal added.
"And we hope to honor this spirit by donating to a cause of his choice – we've reached out to him to make this offer and to let him know we are grateful that he's a customer!"