540 million dollars this is what mercedes f1 team principal toto wolf is worth now the majority of us know toto is the kind smiley and occasionally aggressive team manager but under the surface he is incredibly smart and calculated and this calculated side has allowed mercedes to achieve so much in the past few years now i've said many times that formula one is pay to win but it also pays very well if you do win and so here is how toto's net worth is broken down the majority of his net worth is in assets which does include his mercedes ownership as well as other assets such as houses and cars he also holds 140 million dollars in investments which is mainly just investing in large fortune 500 companies and finally he gets a salary of around 26 million dollars a year ignoring bonuses but how did toto actually amass this half a billion dollar net worth well it came from serious hard work and risk taking which has given toto an incredible life story so let me take you through that and also give an insight into his attitudes that has allowed him to achieve so much in so little time so going all the way back torgan christian wolff yes that is actually his middle name was born in vienna austria in january of 1972 to a relatively poor family and at the age of eight toto's father was diagnosed with brain cancer and passed away only a few years later now obviously this dramatically affected his family emotionally and financially and so when toto was just 12 he was pulled out of private school and put into state school until 18. now usually this would negatively affect a young child but toto was extremely motivated to be successful and during this time he dived into some entrepreneurial activities in the early 90s he started his first ever business selling candles at anti-racism protests in vienna which is quite the niche market but nevertheless he sold a few hundred and it taught him quite a few lessons about creating demand and also during this time toto would hand out leaflets outside an electronics store in a very interesting outfit and to this day toto describes that as his worst ever job and at the age of 17 toto discovered motorsport on his way back from amsterdam with a few mates they drove past the nurburgring and he was instantly hooked he went home sold his car bought asaya ibiza kitted it out and started racing around austria and within a few years was racing in austrian and german formula ford but he wasn't achieving too much success but that was before he turned up to nurburgring for the 24-hour race in 1994 and he got his first taste of success winning in his category and for all we know toto wolff could have become a formula one driver but when karl wendlinger had his crash in 1994 in monaco toto's main sponsor pulled out of the sport causing toto to give up on his dream of being a formula one driver so reality hit him pretty hard when he had to give up on being a formula one driver but he instead dived into the world of business now as i mentioned toto didn't get as much education as he would have liked so he went to vienna university to study economics and during his time got the opportunity to have an internship at a warsaw investment bank and so he dropped out of uni and went for that but after only being there for a few years he got an opportunity for a full-time job as a salesman for an austrian steel company but after all toto is a natural entrepreneur and so he doesn't really like answering to other people and so when the opportunity came around for him to start his own business acting as an agent to the steel company he took it and after working in that business for a few years he made it worth what it was sold it off and went to san francisco to get in on the increasing tech industry and through his time in san francisco he invested in various upstart companies just as the tech bubble was booming and so you can imagine he made a serious amount of money and as any savvy businessman would do he used that money to start his own venture capital firm called march 15 in 1998 which invested in various tech companies all around the world and so you can imagine his firm grew enormously in this time which allowed him to start a second venture capital firm called march 16 in 2004 but here is where it gets really interesting if you remember before i said toto had to give up on his dreams of being a racing driver because he didn't have enough money but after san francisco that was certainly not the case and so in 2002 he dived straight back into competitive racing driving in the fia gt championship before driving in the italian gt championship in 2003 but over the next few years it would seem motor sport would be more than just a hobby for toto you see when he was in san francisco the tang industry seemed to be indestructible but when the dot-com crash came a few years later toto decided to invest instead in motorsport his first investment in motorsport came when he invested in the company called hwa where he took a 49 stake now hwa is a motorsport team that raced mercedes cars in the dtm championship and in 2007 he helped the company get floated on the frankfurt stock exchange now also interestingly this was the time where he met his future wife susie stoddard or who we know now as susie wolf but during this time he didn't just invest in motorsport companies he also invested in drivers with the help of mika hakkanen he invested in various young talents throughout the mid 2000s but as of yet he still wasn't able to reach the pinnacle of motorsport formula one but this all changed in 2009 when he got a call from williams f1 team boss and founder frank williams asking if he wanted to buy any shares in the team and so toto took a 15 stake and within three years was promoted to team principal fifteen years after his dreams of being in formula one as a driver were crushed he was now an f1 instead as a team boss and to be fair to him even to this day the last win williams had in 2012 was under the management of toto wolff and also during this time in 2009 toto had a bit of a midlife crisis and thought he'd have a go at the nurburgring lap record for gt cars and to be fair to him he got it albeit with a bit of bruising but in the summer of 2012 toto got a phone call that would change his life forever it was mercedes or technically daimler and they wanted him to become the executive director of their formula one team and so toto had a meeting with daimler executive wolfgang bernard and they decided that toto would take a 30 stake in the team with daimler holding 60 and nikki louder holding the remaining 10 and well the rest is history just to give some context of how successful toto was with mercedes he's been at the team for nine full seasons and in that time he's won eight constructors titles seven drivers titles achieved a win percentage of 64 and a podium rate of 87 it's simply unbelievable now also in 2020 after the passing of nicki louder and interest from ineos toto's stake in the team increase to 33.3 percent now with all this success you can expect toto's earning quite a lot at mercedes so let's break down his 2021 year in terms of how much he's earned well firstly he got paid his 26 million dollar flat rate salary a bonus of 10 million dollars for winning the constructors championship and 5.6 million dollars from podium bonuses worth 200 000 per podium so in total he earned 41.6 million dollars in 2021 and so roughly we can expect he's earned around 300 million during his time at mercedes but obviously that's before taxes and we can expect hoto to be earning these insane amounts at least until the end of next year when his contract expires and if you remember in 2020 there was a little bit of speculation as to whether toto would actually stay at mercedes and well he's confirmed in that time that he is going to be at mercedes for the foreseeable future what i see happening is toto may be moving out of the race by race operations role and going into a more executive role in the team either way we can expect hoto to stay at mercedes for the foreseeable future right well that's toto's career in short but how has he been able to be so successful what leadership traits or attitudes does he have that has allowed him to achieve so much and in turn earn so much well firstly toto is a serial winner dominating the sport more than anyone before him and he's done that following three main lessons firstly he emphasizes empathy over engineering and what he means by this is he values the importance of relationships over individual talent because realistically you can have the most talented engineers on the grid but if they don't fit into a team then it's simply not going to work he also strongly supports diversity in background in the team because after all diversity and background equals diversity and opinion and perception which can be a valuable asset and his second lesson is he was always expecting the worst because if you fail to prepare you prepare to fail and always expecting the worst allows the team to reduce complacency which is one reason they've been so successful for so many years and finally he pushes for attention to detail in every aspect of the team for example when he joined mercedes back in 2013 he arrived at the reception in the headquarters and realized that there were old newspapers on the tables dirty mugs everywhere etc and so he made it his absolute mission to make every aspect of the team as perfect as possible whether that be building the car or tidying up the headquarters these three lessons toto has followed religiously throughout his life have been the main factors for why he has achieved so much in so little time he instills a culture within a team like no other and it's pretty clear to see and so that is how toto wolf has amassed his massive 540 million dollar net worth now toto is one of the most inspiring figures not just in the world of motorsport but in the wider realms of world sport and business but it's fascinating because this year in 2022 mercedes are having the toughest season they've had in the history of their team and toto needs to be the one to bring them back so it'll be interesting to see how toto rallies up his mercedes troops and how they fight back to the top and one other thing i'm absolutely certain of is that toto wolff's net worth is only going to grow from here on out as well thanks for watching guys i hope you liked the new format video with me putting my face in the video so let me know what you think in the comment section down below and as always make sure to like subscribe and smash that notification bell to be reminded of any new videos [Music] you