Personal submarines, prostitutes and simulated warfare: Inside the insanely luxurious world of billionaires' superyachts
'I expect 2025 to be a good year,' Anders Kurtén, the CEO of the brokerage Fraser Yachts Monaco office, told The Post.
The pandemic led to a rise in yacht sales, and he sees the 'same type of psychological mechanisms at work' right now.
'It's the ultimate personal freedom,' he said.
The growth in yacht sales has happened despite sanctions against Russian buyers, who had previously made up 25% of the top end of the market.
'That's really been backfilled by the Americans, who seem to have this new, hungry appetite for very large yachts,' said Jonathan Beckett, CEO of yacht brokerage Burgess, which has 17 offices across the globe, from New York to Hong Kong. 'I never thought I'd see Americans buying and building boats of this size . But they are.'
The largest super-, mega- and giga- yachts can be more than 500 feet and cost half a billion. Jeff Bezos' $500 million Kuro stretches to 417 feet and it doesn't even crack the world's top 10 largest.
The US's 902 billionaires are still finding fresh ways to enhance these floating mansions. Yachts like the 255-foot ENERGY— which Fraser is listing for €199 million, or roughly $230 million — have Steinway baby grand pianos in the music lounges, beauty salons and beach clubs as standard kit..
'You'll have a full spa team with a beauty technician and a big boat will have a Botox specialist on board,' said Philippa Smith, the founder and managing director of Silver Swan Recruitment, which staffs the yachts, homes and chalets of the global 1% from their offices in London, Miami and Dubai.
She said that the level of service available on today's yachts now greatly exceeds that of even the most luxurious mansions — because where a dozen or so domestic staffers can run a big house, a large yacht may have a crew of 100. At sea, where there's no one to judge, you can simply get away with more.
'I spoke to someone recently who was hiring a naturopath, which is someone that is on board all the time, offering natural treatments, detox plans and daily wellness. You wouldn't have that at home,' she said. 'Obviously you will have a chef, but you might have a specialty Japanese sushi chef for a particular voyage. You'll have a sommelier, a full water sports team, a DJ, a florist, a drone specialist, full security and for children a plethora of nannies, governesses and specialist educators like a marine biologist.'
She recalled an incident where a client's 7-year-old didn't enjoy the yogurt on board. At the snap of a finger, the yacht's chief stewardess had the preferred yogurt sent from Russia by private plane, which met the yacht's helicopter in Corsica — and the choosy child's breakfast was saved.
'Even though these guests are very wealthy and very intelligent, they are dumb in some senses, because they'll be in the middle of the ocean and be requesting the most ridiculous things, bearing in mind you can't just go to a shop,' she said. 'The helicopters are used because they want a particular Champagne tonight.'
A yacht is the ultimate catbird seat from which to watch the world burn, argues Evan Osnos in his new book 'The Haves and Have-Yachts: Dispatches on the Ultrarich' (Scribner, out now).
His subjects range from the booming trade in palatial yachts and doomsday prepping in Silicon Valley, to con-artists like Guo Wengui and the shape-shifting politics of Mark Zuckerberg. But his juiciest reporting reveals how an ostensibly money-losing operation like yachting gels in a parsimonious billionaire's psyche.
'Gigayachts,' he writes, are 'the most expensive objects our species has ever owned — and, as a Silicon Valley CEO put it to me, the best way to 'absorb the most excess capital.'
While a single yacht may cost more than a billionaire's entire real estate portfolio, produce as much greenhouse gas as 1500 passenger cars and depreciate like a ton of lead, not having a permanent address is priceless, he argues.
'Much of the time, superyachts dwell beyond the reach of ordinary law enforcement,' Osnos writes. 'They cruise in international waters, and, when they dock, local cops tend to give them a wide berth; the boats often have private security, and their owners may well be friends with the prime minister.'
One use-case: moving art, jewels or other big ticket items duty-free. Another: taking clandestine business meetings.
'One deal secured on board will pay it all back many times over,' a yacht captain tells Onsnos, 'and it is pretty hard to say no after your kids have been hosted so well for a week.'
Not only does the yachting class enjoy exotic deliveries — bagels from Zabar's, sex workers, a rare melon from the island of Hokkaido' and flamboyant finishes — eel leather seats, a personal submarine, a mini ski-slope — there are also over-the-top amusements.
In the book, Andrew Grant Super, a cofounder of the 'experiential yachting' firm Berkeley Rand in Londons, discloses a few of the yachting experiences he creates for 'bored billionaires.'
'We can plot half of the Pacific Ocean with coordinates, to map out the Battle of Midway,' Super tells Oscnos. 'We re-create the full-blown battles of the giant ships from America and Japan. The kids have haptic guns and haptic vests. We put the smell of cordite and cannon fire on board, pumping around them… We fly 3-D-printed, architectural freestanding restaurants into the middle of the Maldives, on a sand shelf that can only last another eight hours before it disappears.'
The world's biggest yacht, REV OCEAN is specifically designed to offer that type of boundary pushing adventure. When it's delivered in 2027, it will stretch 639.3 feet — only slightly shorter than Trump Tower — gliding guests to expedition sites in the Arctic Circle, the Galapagos and some of earth's least visited realms in seven-star comfort.
Unlike mere pleasure craft, REV is decked out with a state-of-the-art research command center, where real scientists will polish their PhDs, while CEOs play gentleman explorer. It's the newest plaything for Norway's richest man, billionaire Kjell Inge Røkke.
'It's a bit like an SUV or a four-wheel drive vehicle,' says Beckett, who is exclusively chartering REV OCEAN. 'A lot of people want to go off the beaten track. We have a client at the moment, who is wanting to do something in the Amazon or in Antarctica. He's done, and he will continue to do, St Tropez, Mykonos and St. Barts, but he's looking to give his family some really interesting experiences. And there's a lot of people like that.'
Life on board a top yacht has become so excessive that one owner tells Osnos, 'if you don't have some guilt about it, you're a rat.'
But the venture capitalist yachtsman Bill Duker puts the situation in even more dramatic terms, telling Osnos, 'If the rest of the world learns what it's like to live on a yacht like this, they're gonna bring back the guillotine.'

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trailhead Biosystems® Expands Human Cell-Based Product Line with iPSC-Derived A9 Dopaminergic Neurons
BEACHWOOD, Ohio, July 23, 2025 /CNW/ -- Trailhead Biosystems, Inc. ( a biotechnology company pioneering the creation of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived human cells at scale for drug discovery and cell therapy, introduces TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons, a powerful new tool available off-the-shelf for studying Parkinson's disease and other neurodegenerative conditions. A9 dopaminergic neurons play a critical role in movement regulation and are disproportionately affected in Parkinson's disease. Historically, researchers have lacked access to viable human models, relying instead on animal studies with limited relevance. With TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons, scientists now have a human-specific platform to investigate disease mechanisms, develop therapies and accelerate drug discovery. "TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons open new possibilities for Parkinson's research," said Dr. Jan Jensen, Chief Scientific Officer, Chief Technology Officer and founder of Trailhead Biosystems. "These cells enable researchers to study the vulnerabilities of A9 neurons, helping drive progress toward more effective treatments." "For decades, the lack of human A9 neurons has limited our ability to truly understand Parkinson's disease," added Dr. Nooshin Amini, Scientific Director at Trailhead Biosystems. "Now, with TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons, researchers can directly study the exact cells that are most affected, offering hope for groundbreaking insights and future therapies." About Trailhead Biosystems Trailhead Biosystems, Inc. is pioneering an informatics-based approach in regenerative medicine and drug discovery. Founded in 2015 as a spinout from the Cleveland Clinic and Case Western Reserve University, Trailhead emerged from the research of CSO/CTO and founder Dr. Jan Jensen. Trailhead creates optimized human cells at scale with its proprietary High-Dimensional Design-of-Experiments (HD-DoE®) platform, integrating advanced mathematical modeling with high-throughput robotic manufacturing. This innovative system allows Trailhead to develop specialized, high-quality iPSC-derived human cells for drug discovery and cell-based therapies. TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons represent one of many specialized human cell types emerging from this platform, with additional cell models expected in the near future. Learn more about Trailhead Biosystems, TrailBio® A9 Dopaminergic Neurons and HD-DoE® at For more information, please contact: Tim Mauk, Corporate CommunicationsTrailhead BiosystemsEmail: info@ View original content to download multimedia: SOURCE Trailhead Biosystems Inc View original content to download multimedia:
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
S&P 500 Is Getting More Bitcoin Exposure as Block Joins the Club
Block, Jack Dorsey's Bitcoin-focused payments company, is set to join the S&P 500 on Wednesday, a milestone moment for both the company and and foray further into crypto for the benchmark index. Block (XYZ), which was rebranded from Square in 2021, is the second blockchain company to join the club after cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase Global (COIN) was added to the index in mid-May. That means index fund investors will get a modest bump in exposure to the world's largest cryptocurrency bitcoin (BTCUSD). The company takes the spot vacated by Hess Corp., which was acquired by Chevron (CVX) in a deal that closed July 18. It's the third addition of the month, following The Trade Desk (TTD) and Datadog (DDOG). Since the announcement of Block's inclusion late Friday, the shares have risen 9%. Block's stock has benefited from an index effect, which refers to directional pressure on stocks when a company is added to, or removed from, the S&P 500 and other indexes. The most recent research report on the matter from S&P Dow Jones Indices, which studied the price impact of index additions and deletions from 1995 to June 2021, showed that it isn't always much of a force. The median excess returns—defined here as the difference between a stock's total return and that of the broader index—of stocks added to the index, measured from the announcement date to the effective date, was about 8% from 1995 to 1999. From 2000 to 2010, that number shrank to 3.6%, and was essentially nonexistent from 2011 to 2021. And even if an index effect shows up ahead of the official inclusion or deletion date, according to a McKinsey study, the premium or discount has a tendency to dissipate within a few months. What's new can get old pretty fast. Read the original article on Investopedia Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Texas Instruments shares sink as tariff risks cloud chip demand outlook
(Reuters) -Texas Instruments shares slumped nearly 12% in premarket trading on Wednesday, after its quarterly profit forecast indicated a hit to demand for its analog chips that stoked investor fears of tariff-related disruptions. The dour third-quarter profit forecast contrasts with its earlier hopes for a strong rebound in chip demand, increasing concerns about tariff impacts and tempering investor confidence. In response to analysts' questions on a post-earnings call about whether tariffs were prompting customers to pull in orders and bumping up revenue, TI CEO Haviv Ilan said he "can't rule out the possibility". "(TI's) tone has shifted markedly vs last quarter's call as well as vs management's intra-quarter commentary, with seemingly more caution around the geopolitical and tariff environment," said Bernstein analyst, Stacy Rasgon, adding that the shift "felt somewhat sudden". Chipmakers like TI are not directly affected by Trump's higher tariffs yet, but rising costs for chip-making tools and reduced spending by some customers are starting to have an impact. This was evident in the broader semiconductor industry, with both ASML, the biggest supplier of chip-making equipment globally, and TSMC, the world's biggest chipmaking factory, last week, warned about tariff-related uncertainty. "The impact of tariffs/trade is beginning to emerge and we anticipate a continuation of a slightly weaker than seasonal demand environment as the year progresses due to the impact of tariffs," said analysts at J.P. Morgan. Some analysts also expressed concerns about pressure to TI's margins due to the company's rising investments to expand its U.S. manufacturing footprint. Following the results, at least six brokerages cut price targets on the stock, while three raised, as per data compiled by LSEG. The firm is up about 15%, while peer Analog Devices has gained around 11%, so far this year. TI has a 12-month forward price-to-earnings ratio of 34.66, compared to Analog Devices' 27.64.