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‘Grateful and happy’: MacKenzie Bezos keeps US$36 billion in world’s biggest divorce deal, after ceding Amazon control to husband Jeff Bezos

  • MacKenzie Bezos is surrendering three-quarters of the couple’s Amazon shares, but retains a 4 per cent holding that makes her the world’s fourth-richest woman
  • All voting control on the shares has been handed to Jeff Bezos

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Jeff Bezos and wife MacKenzie Bezos arrive at the Vanity Fair Oscar party in Beverly Hills, California, in March 2018. Photo: AP

MacKenzie Bezos, the wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, said Thursday that they had finalised their divorce, and that she would surrender 75 per cent of the couple’s shares in the tech giant.

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MacKenzie Bezos also said she would give all of her stake in The Washington Post and the space exploration firm Blue Origin to her soon-to-be-ex-husband – the world’s richest man – as well as voting control of her remaining Amazon shares, in what is easily the world’s biggest divorce deal.

In a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Amazon said that MacKenzie Bezos now controls 4 per cent of the company’s outstanding common stock.

At Amazon’s current share price of US$1,812 a share that would be worth some US$35.6 billion.

“Grateful to have finished the process of dissolving my marriage with Jeff with support from each other and everyone who reached out to us in kindness,” MacKenzie Bezos wrote on Twitter.

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MacKenzie Bezos and soon-to-be ex-husband Jeff Bezos in 2013. Photo: AFP
MacKenzie Bezos and soon-to-be ex-husband Jeff Bezos in 2013. Photo: AFP

“Happy to be giving him all of my interests in The Washington Post and Blue Origin, and 75% of our Amazon stock plus voting control of my shares to support his continued contributions with the teams of these incredible companies,” MacKenzie Bezos said.

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