Top Stocks of the Forbes 400 Richest

Forbes magazine just released its Forbes 400 list, a rundown of the 400 richest individuals and families in the U.S. The question is, how can we invest on this list?

Obviously, many of these individuals made their fortunes by starting and running their own companies. If these companies are doing well and are publicly traded, then regular Joes like us have the opportunity to participate in the engines behind their wealth growth.

At Stockpickr we reviewed the list and culled the companies connected to the richest 20 Americans.

Microsoft(MSFT), no surprise, makes the top of the list, as it has made the fortunes of some notable wealthy investors -- namely, Bill Gates, who is No. 1 on the Forbes 400 list with a net worth of $59 billion, Paul Allen at No. 11 and Steve Balmer, No. 16.

Microsoft recently dropped the price of its Xbox 360 game console in a move to take market share from Sony's(SNE) PlayStation3. Microsoft has a price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) of 19 and a P/E-to-growth ratio of 1.4. The tech company also pays a dividend of 1.5%.

Microsoft also appears in last week's list of the Top 10 Dividend Raisers by PEG, as it just increased its dividend by 10%. There, Microsoft keeps company with McDonald's(MCD), which raised its dividend 50% and has a P/E of 32 and a PEG of 2.2. Another stock in the portfolio is Zenith National Insurance(ZNT), which raised its dividend by 16% and has a P/E ratio of 6.