Jeff Bezos divorce: MacKenzie to get $36 bn stake in Amazon, become worlds third wealthiest woman
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his soon-to-be-ex-wife, MacKenzie Bezos, have reached a divorce settlement that will give the latter about 4 per cent of the company, a stake worth roughly $36 billion, based on Amazons market value Thursday.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his soon-to-be-ex-wife, MacKenzie Bezos, have reached a divorce settlement that will give the latter about 4 per cent of the company, a stake worth roughly $36 billion, based on Amazon's market value Thursday. The announcement was made by MacKenzie in a tweet which was later retweeted by Jeff. "Grateful to have finished the process of dissolving my marriage with Jeff with support from each other and everyone who reached out to us in kindness, and looking forward to the next phase as co-parents and friends... Excited about my own plans. Grateful for the past as I look forward to what comes next," she tweeted.
The settlement will award Jeff all of the joint holdings in The Washington Post and a space-flight company, Blue Origin. It also gives rest to all speculations around one of the world's richest companies - Amazon - with a market capitalization of $890 billion. The deal would also make MacKenzie the third wealthiest woman in the world L'Oreal heiress Francoise Bettencourt Meyers and Walmart's Alice Walton. Jeff, on the other hand, will continue to own 12 of Amazon and be world's richest man an estimated fortune of $110 billion, ahead of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett.
The divorce should be settled in roughly 90 days, according to an Amazon regulatory filing Thursday. However, the couple hasn't didn't disclose custody terms of their children on Thursday.
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Jeff Bezos' tweet echoed hers and praised MacKenzie Bezos, saying, "She has been an extraordinary partner, ally, and mother. She is resourceful and brilliant and loving, and as our futures unroll, I know I'll always be learning from her."
MacKenzie Bezos had worked in Amazon's early days as an accountant and helped to negotiate contracts. She had met Jeff while they were working for hedge fund D.E. They got married in 1993, about a year before Jeff Bezos founded Amazon as an online bookseller in Seattle, where they settled. She has not had a prominent or public role in Amazon in recent years.
Thursday was the second time the Bezoses used Twitter to announce information about their marriage. "As our family and close friends know, after a period of loving exploration and trial separation, we have decided to divorce and continue our shared lives as friends," they announced in January.
The tweet, which appeared under the signature of "Jeff & MacKenzie" said nothing about their assets, fueling speculation over how they would divide more than $130 billion of assets accumulated during their marriage.
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