Source: Kevin Mazur / Getty
Kanye West was all the buzz in the news this week when reports came forth that he was potentially the richest Black person in United States history. As we shared in our reporting on the earlier story, much of the valuation of West’s deals were speculative in nature and a new analysis debunks some of the headlines.
Forbes examined the report put forth by Bloomberg that valued West’s clothing deal with the Gap at $4.7 billion due to a private bank document. However, Forbes is saying that the much-ballyhooed $6.6 billion number that has been floating around for days doesn’t pass muster.
The folks at Forbes believe that West, very much still a billionaire, is actually worth closer to $1.8 billion, which proves his wealth has grown vastly in under a year when the outlet calculated the Chicago superstar and designer was worth $1.3 billion back in May of 2020. The outlet adds that Robert F. Smith is still the richest Black person in America at $6 billion. In addition, Aliko Dangote of Nigeria is worth $11.8 billion and is the richest Black person in the world.
The same UBS AG bank document Bloomberg used to report on West’s business interests is exactly the same document that Forbes examined. The outlet goes on to say that the bank document focuses solely on projected future earnings and, in fairness, that was clear in the Bloomberg report that nothing was a solid number as of yet.
As the Yeezy Gap partnership is set to launch this summer, it will be some time before the true value of the collaboration is known to the public.
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Photo: Getty
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