Jeff Bezos, World’s richest man agrees $35bn divorce

The world’s richest man, Jeff Bezos, and his wife MacKenzie have agreed a record-breaking divorce settlement worth at least $35bn (£27bn).

Ms Bezos will retain a 4% stake in online retail giant Amazon which her husband of 25 years founded.

She will also give up her interests in the Washington Post newspaper and Mr Bezos’ space travel firm Blue Origin.

The deal dwarfs a previous $3.8bn record set by art dealer Alec Wildenstein and his wife Jocelyn.

Ms Bezos made the announcement in a tweet – her first and only one since joining the microblogging website this month – stating that she was “grateful to have finished the process of dissolving my marriage to Jeff with support from each other”.

Prior to the settlement, Mr Bezos held a 16.3% stake in Amazon. He will retain 75% of that holding but Ms Bezos has transferred all of her voting rights to her former husband,

The couple, who have four children, had been together since before Mr Bezos set up Amazon in 1994, with Ms Bezos employed as one of the firm’s first members of staff.

Amazon is now vast online retail business which last year generated sales of $232.8bn and has helped Mr Bezos and his family amass a $131bn fortune, according to Forbes magazine.

– BBC