There are really things in life that withers as quickly as it blooms. It also happens to entrepreneurs, including billionaires. There are plenty of billionaires who rose to financial success and then filed bankruptcy later on. Donald Trump could have been on this list if he didn't keep his personal money separate from his business money. Here are 5 billionaires who became riches to rags.

Allen Stanford

He is the former Chairman of Stanford Financial Group until he was accused of organizing a financial conspiracy that steals the money out of the investors and used or misused these funds just to support his very extravagant lifestyle. Now he is serving a 110 year sentence after being convicted on March 6 2012 with all charges except one count of wire fraud. The whole Ponzi scheme involved $7 billion in certificates of deposit. One of his inmates assaulted him that left him partially blind

Sean Quinn

Once ranked 164th on Forbes billionaire's list, the economic meltdown last 2008 proved fatal to Quinn's fortune. The $6 billion fortune that he amam, which he earned from his multi-billion dollar mining, manufacturing, real estate and insurance empire, The Quinn Group. He quickly lost all of this after he invested 25% in Anglo Irish Bank, using borrowed money from Anglo. The shares plummeted and became worthless when the bank nationalized in 2009, leaving Quinn with the alleged $3.85 billion he owed to the Anglo Irish Bank's successor institution, the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation. Formerly known as a successful entrepreneur since 1970, he is now famous being the biggest individual loser of the 2008 global financial meltdown.

Patricia Kluge

Another one of the victims of the 2008 global financial meltdown is Patricia Kluge. Wife of the late television mogul, billionaire John Kluge, she marketed a 960-acre vineyard after their divorce in 1990. She loaned close to $70 million in order to put up the facilities and ended up failing and when the real estate crisis came. The property was foreclosed. Guess who bought the property. Donald Trump.

Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson

He was the chairman and former owner of West Ham United FC. He and his son Thor has been the two richest people in Iceland, Thor being the first. He once had a net worth of $1.1 billion but it dwindled down to zero when he and his son and business partner Thor was hit by the credit crisis in their country. He was pointed out as one of the cause of the disaster because of his involvement in illegal activities such as fraud and embezzlement in the past. He was declared backrupt by the Icelandic court with debts of 96 billion ISK (Icelandic Krona).

Alberto Vilar

This Cuban-American investor and philantrophist was known as the patron of opera because of his generous donations to opera opera companies, performing arts organizations, and educational institutions in several parts of the world. In 1979, he co-founded the investment firm Amerindo with partner Gary Tanaka. His fortune topped at $1 billion in 2001. Amerindo's main investment activities were on technology funds and was affected severely by the stock market crash of 2000. He was convicted with money laundering, investment advisor fraud, securities fraud, wire fraud and mail fraud when the prosecution charged that some of the money stolen from his clients was used to meet his public philanthropic commitments. In November 2008 and was sentenced to nine years in prison.