With all the rumors about an alleged impending divorce in the marriage between Beyonce and Jay-Z, it’s time to weigh in on what happens to the fortunes both superstars have amassed over the length of their respective spectacular careers.
BlackEnterprise.com has heard nothing even remotely close to hard evidence that one of America’s top 10 power couples is heading to splitsville, but as you know, haters are out there and hard at work, and so this story simply refuses to lose traction.
Beyonce and Jay-Z’s meteoric and heavily documented rise to the top over the past 12 years makes it just good business to cultivate their carefully crafted public image; it’s simply in their best interests to do so.
So as the speculations continue to make the rounds, we asked Lori Anne Douglass, a partner with the law firm Moses and Singer and a specialist on trusts and estates as well as matrimonial and family practice, what would happen to all that cheddar if Bey and Jay did decide to legally part ways.
Douglass says the world still doesn’t even know if the Carters even signed a prenuptial agreement. So, without a prenup to go by, it’s tough to speculate how their wealth will be divvied up.
“I would assume Beyonce and Jay-Z have a prenuptial agreement and even if they don’t, I can imagine they’ll work out the money,” Douglass says. “He’ll probably keep his wealth and she hers. Her net worth is about $400 million and his is a little bit more because he’s about 13 years older maybe $700 million. My guess is they’ve never even co-mingled any of their assets.”
She adds that both players would be relatively financially unscathed if there’s any substance to all this divorce talk. “Jay and Bey are both star powers and if one of them was and the other wasn’t there would more to this story. In this case it’s just a sad destruction of Beyoncé and Jay-Z.”
Read more about the business implications if indeed the Carters are heading for divorce on the next page …
The Carters (Image: File)There are very few couples that have the wealth and star power each bring to the table with each contributing literally 50% to their marriage, it’s unlikely both of them would waltz down the aisle without protecting themselves from losing their shirts if things didn’t work out.
According to the New York Daily News, “The couple can say goodbye to their carefully crafted image as the first family of hip-hop— the one that’s turning the “On the Run†tour into a $100 million juggernaut. But Beyonce and Jay-Z’s other business ventures – his 40/40 clubs and sports agency, her Pepsi and L’Oreal deals – will thrive because the two never rode each others coattails.”
There’s also talk that the two didn’t get married for love but instead struck a business arrangement. While that is plausible, we do know there are some marriages in the entertainment industry that are financial partnerships, BE has not heard or seen any concrete evidence to support that rumor.
It’s also prudent to look into the financial benefits to both power players exchanging vows. The enormous amounts of money potentially on the line makes the circumstances extremely unusual especially when compared to marriages for regular folks.
“The way divorce works, it’s a financial arrangement,” Douglass says. “The court just sees it as a financial partnership and looks at the contribution of each partner during the marriage and distributes said assets accordingly. So with the Carter marriage, that will happen even if they have no prenup. They’ll just file for No-Fault. I believe they are domiciled in New York. Your domiciliary decides what court you’ll take the divorce to and I will assume that they agree on paper that you keep your money and i will keep mine. New York state now recognizes no fault divorce — so they’ll just say Irreconcilable differences and reach an agreement on the terms.”