The One Thing That Hurt Jeff Bezos The Most In His Divorce
The richest person in the world, Jeff Bezos, has an estimated net worth of nearly $200 billion, according to Investopedia. For scale, that is approximately equal to the country of New Zealand's annual gross domestic product. And that is after his highly publicized divorce settlement, in which Bezos's ex-wife, Mackenzie Scott, was awarded her own small country's worth of income as well as a 3% stake in Amazon.
If you didn't already know, there was obviously no prenuptial agreement. But as divorce lawyer Jessica T. Ornsby, Esq., explained to Nicki Swift, the lack of prenup wasn't even the real issue for Bezos. "By now we all know that Jeff Bezos did not have a prenup. That sounds like it would be detrimental, but in Bezos' situation it may not have mattered, anyway," she explained.
Whatever Bezos wanted the public to believe, Ornsby thinks dividing the assets 50/50 was motivated less by generosity than good old fashioned self-interest and basic math. "It is evident that Bezos wanted to portray to the media the now-popular idea of an amicable 'conscious uncoupling' as opposed to a contentious and dramatic divorce," Ornsby said. "But I believe that this decision was based primarily upon everything that was at stake."
Keep scrolling to learn why.
Bezos' divorce was always going to be messy
Divorce lawyer Jessica T. Ornsby, Esq., tells Nicki Swift that there were so many moving parts to consider in Jeff Bezos' divorce from Mackenzie Scott that, prenup or no prenup, the outcome was likely to be the same.
"During the course of the marriage, Bezos became the wealthiest man in the world, increasing his net worth in an amount that was almost certainly unconscionable at the time of the marriage," Ornsby pointed out, continuing, "He also became the CEO of the Amazon powerhouse and allegedly had an affair. Additionally, it had been 25 years since the date of the marriage."
Put together, all of these factors would have made the divorce "a mess." But the biggest potential headache for Bezos would have been calculating how much of Amazon that Scott was legally entitled to, since she helped create it.
"His wife helped Bezos start Amazon, worked for the company in its early years, and essentially helped it grow into what it is today. Even with a prenuptial agreement, it would be very difficult to place a dollar amount on the value of his wife's contributions," Ornsby said. "Additionally, Amazon's growth has been so significant that it is unlikely any prenup could have properly shielded the company, in its entirety, from division pursuant to divorce."
Basically — the lady has earned her coin.