The Koch brothers are worth over $50 billion each after years of family feuds and massive lawsuits — here's how they spend their wealth

iStock; Mark Lennihan/AP Images; Hoover Institution/YouTube; Samantha Lee/Business Insider

• The Koch brothers are two of the richest men in the world.
• Charles and David Koch each have a net worth of $53.7 billion, according to Forbes.
• Their fortunes come from their 42% stakes in the Koch family business: Koch Industries.
• Charles is currently the company's president and CEO, while David just announced that he was retiring from the firm.

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The Koch brothers are two of the richest people on planet earth.

Charles and David Koch tied for eighth on Forbes' 2018 list of the wealthiest billionaires in the world.

And they're also two of the most controversial billionaires out there, at least when it comes to their political contributions. Jane Mayer's 2015 book "Dark Money" outlined how the two Kansas natives reportedly used their fortunes to forge a formidable web of political influence, with the intent of promoting their libertarian values.

Still, that hasn't stopped the Kochs from clashing with figures on the right, mostly notably US president Donald Trump. The two brothers have spoken out against Trump's tariffs.

So how did the Kochs come to amass so much wealth and wield such influence in the first place? The answer lies within the history of their family business: Koch Industries.

Here's a look at how the brothers became billionaires in the first place.

The groundwork for the duo's wealth was laid by their father, Texas native and MIT graduate Fred C. Koch.

Sue Ogrocki/AP Images

Source: "Sons of Wichita," "Dark Money"

The family patriarch joined the Keith-Winkler Engineering Company of Wichita, Kansas in 1925. Later that year, the firm was renamed the Winkler-Koch Engineering Company. A groundbreaking gasoline refinement technique bolstered the young company.

Dave Miller/Flickr

Source: "Dark Money," "Sons of Wichita," Fred and Mary Koch Foundation

But lawsuits from established competitors forced Koch Sr.'s firm to look abroad for work. In the 1920s and 1930s, the Winkler-Koch Engineering Company ventured into a Europe on the verge of war, building refineries that proved crucial to the development of both the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin and Nazi Germany.

Sue Ogrocki/AP Images

Sources: HuffPost, The New York Times, "Dark Money," NPR

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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