(José Niño, Headline USA) A widely circulated post from the Kobeissi Letter told followers that the United States’ richest 1 percent now hold 50.1 percent of all equity and mutual fund wealth. Kobeissi Letter tweeted, “BREAKING: The wealthiest 1% of US earners now own 50.1% of US equity and mutual fund holdings.”
To put this into perspective, their ownership stood at 40.1% in 1990 and 39.6% in 2001.
At the same time, the next 9% wealthiest households own 37.3%, and the middle 40% own just 11.7%.
By comparison, the bottom 50.0% of earners hold just 1.1%.
As a result, the top 10% of earners now own ~87.4% of all equity and mutual fund assets.”
BREAKING: The wealthiest 1% of US earners now own 50.1% of US equity and mutual fund holdings.
To put this into perspective, their ownership stood at 40.1% in 1990 and 39.6% in 2001.
At the same time, the next 9% wealthiest households own 37.3%, and the middle 40% own just… pic.twitter.com/ZqZNwelUnH
— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) July 28, 2026
“Asset owners are the only winners in this economy,” the account wrote in the final sentence of the tweet.
That top line survives scrutiny. The Federal Reserve’s Distributional Financial Accounts, tracked on FRED, show the wealthiest 1 percent sitting at 50.2 percent of corporate equities and mutual fund shares as of the first quarter of 2026, the newest quarter on record.
Households in the next 9 percent claim about 37 percent, per the St. Louis Fed. Everyone in the bottom half splits roughly 1.1 percent. Add the first two groups together and the wealthiest tenth of the country controls nearly 87 percent of the market.
Total wealth follows a starker path. The top 1 percent’s slice of household net worth rose to 31.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2025, a high the Fed had not recorded since it began measuring in 1989, then settled back to 31.6 percent early this year.
José Niño is the deputy editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/JoseAlNino
