Amazon's Bezos finalizes divorce with Sh3.9 trillion settlement

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and wife MacKenzie Bezos, pictured here in February 2017, finalized their divorce at Sh3.9 trillion [Photo, Courtesy]

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Bezos finalized their divorce Friday to the tune of a Sh3.9 trillion settlement, Bloomberg News reported.

Under the agreement, MacKenzie Bezos, 49, will receive approximately 19.7 million Amazon.com shares, giving her a four percent stake in the company valued at Sh3.9 trillion (USD 38.3 billion), and landing her at 22nd on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the news service said.

A judge in Washington state's King County finalized the divorce. Jeff Bezos, 55, will retain a 12 percent stake and remain the world's richest man.

MacKenzie Bezos, a novelist, has said she would give all of her stake in The Washington Post and the space exploration firm Blue Origin to her husband as well as voting control of her remaining Amazon stock.

She has also promised to donate half her fortune to charity, joining the ranks of the world's ultra-wealthy philanthropists as a signatory of the Giving Pledge.

The personal life of Jeff Bezos was thrust into the spotlight with the announcement in January that he and his wife were divorcing after 25 years of marriage and the revelation by the National Enquirer that he had been having an affair with a former news anchor, Lauren Sanchez.

Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos married in 1993 and have four children. Jeff Bezos founded Amazon in their Seattle garage in 1994 and turned it into a colossus that dominates online retail.