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SPLIT GATE
BILL and Melinda Gates are getting divorced - and she could get a multi-billion dollar settlement from the fourth richest man in the world.
The Microsoft co-founder, who is worth a whopping $124billion, posted the news to his official Twitter account on Monday as the Gates empire and fortune now hang in the balance.
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Gates said they decided to "end our marriage" after a "great deal of thought and a lot of work" - two years after his wife admitted that marital life was "really hard."
He noted that they had raised "three incredible children" and worked to help people all over the world with their philanthropy work.
"We continue to share a belief in that mission and will continue our work at the foundation, but we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives," Gates wrote.
"We ask for space and privacy for our family as we begin to navigate this new life," he concluded. Melinda tweeted an identical statement to her account.
News of the divorce comes after:
- Gates says the world won’t return to normal until the end of 2022
- He warns Bitcoin fans to avoid buying the cryptocurrency
- Bonkers conspiracy theory in Texas claims storm sent by Gates
- Microsoft founder says it’d be ‘easy’ to solve the Covid pandemic
Gates tweaked his Twitter settings so only the people he mentioned in the tweet at 4.30pm ET could reply.
After 15 minutes, his statement had amassed 2,926 retweets, it was quoted 4,489 times, and was liked 10.2K times.
The couple's eldest daughter, Jennifer, 25, commented on the divorce in an Instagram story shortly after her parents went public.
"I’m still learning how to best support my own process and emotions as well as my family members at this time and am grateful for the space to do so," she wrote.
Melinda previously admitted to The Sunday Times that being with Bill was often “incredibly hard” when they marked 25 years of marriage.
“‘When he was having trouble making the decision about getting married, he was incredibly clear that it was not about me, it was about ‘Can I get the balance right between work and family life?”’ she said in 2019.
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Tech mogul Gates, who has become a leading figure in the fight against Covid-19, was the richest man in the world until Amazon's Jeff Bezos knocked him off his perch in 2017.
Last year, the 64-year-old became the world's second-richest person – with a measly $124billion fortune – as he stepped down from Microsoft's board to focus on their charitable endeavors.
Although he's given $5 billion to charity since 1994, Gates is earning money at a faster rate than he's donated it, according to reports.
Now, the bombshell divorce is calling the Gates fortune into question because a lot of it has not been given to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation headed by the couple.
Like Tesla CEO Elon Musk, some of Gates' biggest splurges have been on the property, recently purchasing an oceanfront colossus near San Diego, California.
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He also owns a string of luxury cars, however, including pricey Porsches but it's unclear how the Gates fortune will be split now that they're getting divorced.
Melinda was a high-powered Microsoft executive before meeting and marrying Bill and going on to have three kids with him, Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe.
She formalized the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000 and the couple has forked out $45 billion addressing major global issues, like gender equality and poverty.
Two years before Bill announced their bombshell divorce, he had listed the pros and cons of marriage on a whiteboard in Netflix’s three-episode series, “Inside Bill’s Brain."
After a year of dating, Melinda described how they had reached a crossroads in their relationship and Bill had to make a decision.
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"His whiteboard had the pros and the cons of getting married," his estranged wife said in the documentary. "His whiteboard had the pros and the cons of getting married."
During the 2019 documentary, Gates clarified that he took tying the knot "very seriously."
“She had other boyfriends, and I had Microsoft,” Bill said. “We were like, ‘Hey we are not really serious about each other, are we? We are not going to demand each other’s time.'"
“I was new to Microsoft, there were a lot of men there and ... you are still looking around," Melinda agreed.
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But Bill described his wife as a "truly equal partner," noting: “She’s a lot like me in that she is optimistic and she is interested in science. She is better with people than I am.
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"She’s a tiny bit less hard core about knowing, you know, immunology, than I am," he added.
The couple eventually tied the knot in Lanai, Hawaii, when Gates was 38 and Melinda was 29, reported the Associated Press.
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