On Wednesday, Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos announced that he and wife MacKenzie Bezos are getting a divorce after a trial separation. "We feel incredibly lucky to have found each other and deeply grateful for every one of the years we have been married to each other," the couple said a joint statement. "If we had known we would separate after 25 years, we would do it all again." The couple, who have four children, say they plan to remain a family and "cherished friends."
Bezos is thought to be the world's wealthiest man, worth an estimated $137 billion, and Amazon just became the most valuable publicly traded company in the U.S., with a market value Wednesday of $811 billion. The terms of their divorce settlement are not public, but "if MacKenzie Bezos were to receive a quarter of her husband's estimated fortune in the divorce — $40 billion — she would be among the world's richest women," CBS News reports. "The property acquired during the marriage is common property," said Jennifer Payseno, a family lawyer at the Seattle firm McKinley Irvin. She and other divorce experts said they expected the Bezoses already reached a private, out-of-court division of their assets.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Airplane food is reportedly getting much worseCockroaches and E. coli are among the recent problems encountered in the skies
-
What Mike Huckabee means for US-Israel relationsIn the Spotlight Some observers are worried that the conservative evangelical minister could be a destabilizing influence on an already volatile region
-
Crossword: November 19, 2024The Week's daily crossword
-
Boeing machinists approve contract, end strikeSpeed Read The company's largest union approved the new contract offer, ending a seven-week strike
-
US economy still strong in final preelection reportSpeed Read It grew at a solid 2.8% annual rate from July through September
-
Boeing machinists reject deal, continue strikeSpeed Read The rejection came the same day Boeing reported a $6.2 billion quarterly loss
-
Ports reopen after dockworkers halt strikeSpeed Read The 36 ports that closed this week, from Maine to Texas, will start reopening today
-
Empty-nest boomers aren't selling their big homesSpeed Read Most Americans 60 and older do not intend to move, according to a recent survey
-
Brazil accuses Musk of 'disinformation campaign'Speed Read A Brazilian Supreme Court judge has opened an inquiry into Elon Musk and X
-
Disney board fends off Peltz infiltration bidSpeed Read Disney CEO Bob Iger has defeated activist investor Nelson Peltz in a contentious proxy battle
-
Disney and DeSantis reach detenteSpeed Read The Florida governor and Disney settle a yearslong litigation over control of the tourism district
