A new report at Forbes makes it official: Kanye West is a billionaire. That West has made significant money from his music and his forays into sneakers is not in doubt, but now there’s an actual dollar amount associated with it. As Forbes writer Zack O’Malley Greenburg notes, the magazine confirming West’s net worth has been something of an obsession for West.
Greenburg writes that this stems from an earlier appearance on the cover of Forbes: “without sufficient documentation on his unusual stake, versus just his word and industry guesstimates, we didn’t call him a billionaire. And that grated on him. As the year wore on, he protested publicly.” West, after all, is no stranger to contentious public declarations. He recently offered Forbes an in-depth look into his finances, which brings us to where we are today.
The Guardian reported on the Forbes designation, breaking down how the publication estimated West’s net worth at $1.3 billion.
That includes his stake in the Yeezy trainer line, which Forbes describes as “one of the great retail stories of the century”, worth $1.26bn (£1.0bn). Added to that, Forbes said the statement of assets supplied to them by West’s team lists $17m in cash (£13.6m) and $35m in stocks (£28m).
It’s notable that West estimates his own net worth at around $3 billion. As Greenburg writes, the disparity between West’s own estimates and those featured in Forbes have to do with the value of the Yeezy line, and whether it would thrive if removed from Adidas. “Taking Yeezy away from Adidas seems almost prohibitively cumbersome, if not contractually impossible,” Greenburg notes.
Regardless, it’s a moment of vindication for West. And it begs the question: will the designation change his approach to life, art or philanthropy? West’s own public image has shifted somewhat in the last year, after all.
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