Bill and Melinda Gates divorce latest: Couple to ‘split property according to separation contract as they had NO prenup’
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BILL and Melinda Gates have called it quits after a 27-year marriage, the couple announced on Monday on Twitter.
With the co-founder and former CEO of Microsoft as the fourth richest man in the world, and with the pair having a combined net worth of $130 billion, many are wondering how their assets would be divided in a divorce.
The Sun has seen their court documents, which makes clear they have no prenup. Instead, they have asked the judge to grant their separation date as the official divorce date.
As they have no prenup, it is understood the couple will split their property according to a separation contract.
Bill and Melinda have three children together - Jennifer, Phoebe, and Rory Gates.
On Twitter on Monday, the two wrote: “After a great deal of thought and a lot of work on our relationship, we have made the decision to end our marriage,”
The tech mogul added that they “no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives,”
He noted that they had raised "three incredible children" and worked to help people all over the world.
Bill and Melinda met at Microsoft. She had been a marketing manager at the software company.
The two got married in Hawaii in 1994 after Bill Gates had weighed the pros and cons on a blackboard.
Read our Bill Gates live blog below for the very latest news and updates...
CHINESE SOCIAL MEDIA BUZZING WITH NEWS OF BILL AND MELINDA GATES DIVORCE
The "Bill Gates' divorce" hashtag has generated a ton of buzz on China's Weibo platform, which is similar to Twitter.
The hashtag had generated more than 830 million views and 66,000 discussion posts on the platform by Wednesday, according to .
The outlet notes that Bill is particularly popular in the country.
MELINDA GATES CALLED HER MARRIAGE TO BILL 'IRRETRIEVABLY BROKEN' IN COURT DOCS
Melinda Gates said her marriage to Bill Gates is "irretrievably broken," according to court documents about their separation and divorce.
"We ask the court to dissolve our marriage and find that our marital community ended on the date stated in our separation contract," her petition for divorce read.
The exact date of separation is not clear.
Whether or not the couple has a prenup has not definitively been revealed.
DO BILL AND MELINDA GATES HAVE A PRENUP?
It is unclear whether or not Bill and Melinda Gates .
It was previously reported that Bill and Melinda Gates signed a prenup, but it .
The legal filing for the couple's divorce states the only written agreement that relates to the divorce is a separation contract.
Leslie Barbara, Chair of the Divorce and Family Law Group at Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, says they may have had an earlier prenup which expired years ago.
She told The Sun exclusively: "Right now they filed a separation agreement that doesn't necessarily mean there wasn't a prenuptial agreement. There could have been one that they modified and turned into a separation agreement."
“In other words, parties can enter into a prenuptial agreement, they could decide to rescind it and not have one, they can add sunset clauses to them [cease to have effect after a specific date]."
BILL AND MELINDA GATES DISAGREED ON SOME ASPECTS OF HAVING KIDS
Bill Gates was apparently "" when his wife, Melinda, decided not to go back to work after she had their first child, Jennifer.
Melinda shared in her 2019 book, The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women Changes the World, that her husband said, "What do you mean, you’re not going back?” when she told him of her decision.
“And I said: ‘We’re lucky enough not to need my income. So this is about how we want to raise a family. You’re not going to downshift at work, and I don’t see how I can put in the hours I need to do a great job at work and raise a family at the same time."'
One area they did seem to agree was on not allowing their kids too much access to technology.
"We often set a time after which there is no screen time," Bill once told the .
"We don't have cellphones at the table when we are having a meal, we didn't give our kids cell phones until they were 14, and they complained other kids got them earlier,” he explained.
HOW MANY KIDS DO BILL AND MELINDA GATES SHARE?
Bill and Melinda Gates announced their divorce on Monday, and some have questioned whether there will be any issues of child support in their separation.
The couple shares three children: Jennifer, 25, their son Rory, 21, and daughter Phoebe, now 18.
None of them are minors, and Melinda is reportedly not requesting child support.
BILL GATES WAS SURPRISED WHEN MELINDA DIDN'T WANT TO RETURN TO WORK AFTER GIVING BIRTH
Melinda Gates once wrote that her husband, Bill Gates, was shocked when she after she had her first baby.
She shared the revelation in her 2019 book, The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women Changes the World.
“He was stunned,” she wrote, noting that he responded with, “What do you mean, you’re not going back?”
“And I said: ‘We’re lucky enough not to need my income. So this is about how we want to raise a family. You’re not going to downshift at work, and I don’t see how I can put in the hours I need to do a great job at work and raise a family at the same time."'
EXPIRED PRENUP?
Leslie Barbara, Chair of the Divorce and Family Law Group at Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, says they may have had an earlier prenup which expired years ago.
She told The Sun exclusively: “Right now they filed a separation agreement that doesn’t necessarily mean there wasn’t a prenuptial agreement.
“There could have been one that they modified and turned into a separation agreement.
“In other words, parties can enter into a prenuptial agreement, they could decide to rescind it and not have one, they can add sunset clauses to them [cease to have effect after a specific date].
CLOSING THE GATES
Bill Gates’ after he and his wife of 27 years announced they are divorcing.
Properties up for grabs include a $123million mansion with a trampoline room and a $43million oceanfront mansion with a ten-person jacuzzi.
Gates, worth $130.5billion is one of the only eight people in the world worth over $100billion, and is the fourth richest man in the world.
WHAT DID BILL GATES AND HIS EX DO ON THEIR NC TRIPS?
While in North Carolina, the former couple would ride dune buggies, hang-glide, enjoy long walks on the beach, and “play putt-putt while discussing biotechnology” Bill revealed during the bombshell 1997 interview.
“We share our thoughts about the world and ourselves,” Winblad explained.
“And we marvel about how, as two young overachievers, we began a great adventure on the fringes of a little-known industry and it landed us at the center of an amazing universe.”
It isn’t clear how long or if these yearly trips continued after this interview.
The article also notes that Gates had a picture Winblad on a trip to hanging in his office 24 years ago, as well as a snap of his wife with nine friends on a 1995 vacation to .
WHAT ARE THE MOST EXPENSIVE DIVORCES?
Although Bill and Melinda Gates’ divorce might be the most expensive one ever recorded – even potentially dropping Bill from the fourth richest man on earth to the 17th in a 50-50 split –
Perhaps the most famous example was the split between the world’s richest man Jeff Bezos and his wife MacKenzie Scott, in which Scott received $35.6billion in Amazon stock.
She became the third-richest woman in the world at the time, and now is to the richest as her net worth rocketed to $62billion by late 2020 thanks to Amazon’s value exploding during the pandemic.
Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi arms dealer who built a $4 billion fortune, divorced Englishwoman Sandra Daly in 1974 — in a reported $874 million split, which was the most expensive in history at the time.
Elin Nordegren divorced golf legend Tiger Woods in 2010 for a reported $110million.
WHAT IS RORY GATES’ NET WORTH?
Rory Gates certainly isn’t poor, with his net worth estimated at around $20million, according to several websites.
But, his dad has stressed that each of his kids will get just a small slice of his multi-billion-dollar wealth.
In the 30 years from 1987 to 2016, Bill and Melinda Gates amassed about $120billion, reported in 2018.
Bill, the , has spoken in the past about how each of his would only inherit about $10million of his massive fortune.
During a Reddit Q&A session in 2013, when asked whether it was true he would give Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe $10million each, confirmed that this amount was for their benefit.
WHAT IS CHARLIE MUNGER’S NET WORTH?
Munger has an estimated net worth of $2.1billion.
The executive is also a philanthropist and has reportedly donated $110million to the University of Michigan to fund a new “state of the art” residence hall.
He has also donated $65million to the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, making it the largest donation in school’s history.
Munger and his second late wife Nancy previously donated 500 shares of Berkshire Hathaway Class A stock, then valued at $43.5million in 2004, to Stanford to build a graduate student housing complex.
WHO IS CHARLIE MUNGER?
Soon to be divorcé Bill Gates has hired Charles Munger to manage his billion-dollar split from Melinda.
The 97-year-old lawyer frequents the same social circle as he is close pals with billionaire Warren Buffett.
Charles Munger is a billionaire American businessman, investor, and real estate attorney. He is vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate controlled by Warren Buffett.
The duo are best friends and have known each other since Munger met Buffett at a dinner party in 1959.
Coincidentally, Munger worked at Buffett’s grandfather’s grocery store, Buffet & Sons when he was a teenager.
PAPERS FILED FOR DIVORCE WITH NO PRENUP
Bill and Melinda Gates have filed for divorce, and court documents show there is no prenup agreement.
According to , which has seen the court documents, the Gates have filed for divorce, saying their marriage is “irretrievably broken.”
The document asks for the judge to make their pre-signed separation date as their divorce date. The separation papers were not included in the divorce document.
The two have asked for a trial date in April 2022, but will likely settle this without a trial.
97-YEAR-OLD ATTORNEY
Bill Gates has hired , who is not a family lawyer, according to reports, which Leslie sees as a "smart choice.";
His expertise lies in business, philanthropy and real estate and he has been friends with Bill for many years since their time working together at Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett's holding company.
$130BN
The founder, 65, and his wife have an estimated combined wealth of $130billion, with , an art collection, private jet, and fleet of luxury cars.
There for the couple, who share three children.
The filing states the only written agreement that relates to the divorce is a separation contract.
'IRRETRIEVABLY BROKEN'
Legal papers obtained by The Sun revealed , 56, filed for the divorce, and said that the "parties are separated".
"The marriage is irretrievably broken," the documents say.
"We ask the court to dissolve our marriage and find that our marital community ended on the date stated in our separation contract."
MEMES IN FULL SWING AS GATES ANNOUNCED DIVORCE
Although Bill and Melinda Gates announced their divorce on Twitter on Monday, it wasn't too soon for
People poked fun at the tech giant's founder's PC issues: “Are bill and melinda gates really going through a… you know… *windows 98 shutdown sound* divorce?” another.
“Bill Gates logging into his marriage this morning,” a third user, alongside the Microsoft error image reading: “Your marriage ran into a problem that it couldn’t handle, and now it needs to shut down.”
Others joked about a similar divorce from Jeff Bezos.
“Bill Gates looking at after the divorce from Melinda,” read of the iconic meme of two identical Spidermen pointing at each other.
“So what I’m hearing is… Melinda Gates is single now?” wrote one person, alongside a picture of Homer Simpson in a wedding dress.
OLD BILL GATES MEMES RESURFACE IN WAKE OF DIVORCE NEWS
Memes of Bill and Melinda Gates' split have gone viral on social media - but that's not stopping some from resurfacing already meme'd content related to Bill Gates.
When launching Windows 95, Bill Gates awkwardly danced on stage to The Rolling Stones' Start Me Up, in a that has commonly surfaced social media.
This time around, people are making jokes regarding the couple's impending divorce.
"Billy G and the boys meeting up at Chili’s after the divorce is final," wrote one person while sharing the viral video.
BILL AND MELINDA WORKING ON VACCINE DISTRIBUTION SINCE LAUNCH OF FOUNDATION
The billionaire philanthropist couple has been working on increasing vaccine distribution across the world since they launched the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000.
Since then, they have been able to increase supply of routine vaccines like measles and mumps, while also improving current vaccine distribution methods.
In 2010, the foundation announced it was donating $10 billion for vaccine research over the next decade to help research, develop and deliver vaccines to the world's poorest countries.
By 2020, the foundation committed more than $1.7 billion to stopping Covid-19.
A 'TIME' LINE: BILL AND MELINDA BECOME TIME PERSONS OF THE YEAR
In December 2005, Time Magazine named Bill and Melinda Gates as the Persons of the Year along with U2 singer Bono, calling all three of the "The Good Samaritans."
Earlier that year, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation committed $750 million improving child immunizations, accelerating new vaccines, and strengthening vaccine delivery systems.
"We're grateful that Time recognizes the importance of the world's inequities, whether they are in the United States or thousands of miles away," the couple at the time.
"We realize that we've been extremely fortunate in business, and we want to give back in ways that can do the most good for the most people. But we also believe that everyone has something to offer — time, money, or energy — that can help others," they added.
"FARMER BILL"
Bill Gates, the fourth richest man in the world with a networth of about $123 billion, is also the largest landowner in the United States.
Gates owns nearly 270,000 acres of land across more than 12 states, with the largest in Louisiana.
Eric O'Keefe, 's editor, wrote in a January piece: "Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, has an alter ego: Farmer Bill, the guy who owns more farmland than anyone else in America."
Last year Bill and Melinda launched a , known as Gates Ag One, which is based in the greater St. Louis area.
WHAT ARE THE MOST EXPENSIVE DIVORCES? (CONT.)
Divorces don't need to be in the billions to be expensive - just ask these couples below that experienced some of the most expensive divorces in history.
Swiss socialite Jocelyn Dayannys da Silva Bezerra Périsset married horse-racing expert Alec Wildenstein, whom she met while on safari in Kenya.
Following a bitter domestic dispute between the two involving
A two-year divorce battle followed, in which Jocelyn was ultimately given a $2.5billion settlement and $100million every year for 13 years afterward.
NBA hero Michael Jordan married Juanita Vanoy at the Little White Chapel in Las Vegas in 1989 and ended up going through two separate divorce sagas with her.
Vanoy received a $168million settlement, which made it the most expensive celebrity divorce at the time, eclipsing Neil Diamond's 1995 divorce from Marcia Murphey which cost him an estimated $150million.
WHAT ARE THE MOST EXPENSIVE DIVORCES?
Although Bill and Melinda Gates' divorce might be the most expensive one ever recorded - even potentially dropping Bill from the fourth richest man on earth to the 17th in a 50-50 split -
Perhaps the most famous example was the split between the world's richest man Jeff Bezos and his wife MacKenzie Scott, in which Scott received $35.6billion in Amazon stock.
She became the third-richest woman in the world at the time, and now is to the richest as her net worth rocketed to $62billion by late 2020 thanks to Amazon's value exploding during the pandemic.
Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi arms dealer who built a $4 billion fortune, divorced Englishwoman Sandra Daly in 1974 — in a reported $874 million split, which was the most expensive in history at the time.
Elin Nordegren divorced golf legend Tiger Woods in 2010 for a reported $110million.
BILL AND MELINDA LIMITED THEIR CHILDREN'S SCREEN TIME
The tech couple tried to limit their three children's screen time as much as possible at home - even as
"We often set a time after which there is no screen time," Bill once told the .
"And in their case, that helps them get to sleep at a reasonable hour.”
He added that their kids didn’t get cell phones until they were teenagers.
"We don't have cellphones at the table when we are having a meal, we didn't give our kids cell phones until they were 14, and they complained other kids got them earlier,” he explained.