As of Friday morning, everyone who owns a piece of this little social-networking project called Facebook officially became ridiculously rich, thanks to the company’s initial public offering. CEO/co-founder Mark Zuckerberg is now worth more than $17 billion; the guy who in 2005 painted the walls of Facebook’s California office and shrewdly opted for stock shares instead of a few grand for his services made $200 million (just kill me). And Bono, U2 front man, non-needer of loads of cash? Yeah, he’s looking at a cool $1.5 billion, maybe more.
Bono is a co-founder of an investment firm called Elevation Partners, which back in 2009 plunked down $90 million in Facebook, good enough for roughly 2.3 percent of the company. That $90 million today is said to be worth more than $1.5 billion, with some estimates placing it closer to $2 billion.
While all that money obviously won’t wind up in Bono’s hands, Friday will be a, uh, beautiful day (you had to know that was coming) for the singer, easily enough to make him the richest performer in the music biz. Paul McCartney, the new No. 2, is slummin’ it with a net worth of just over $1 billion. Peasant! For sake of comparisons, Madonna and Bruce Springsteen, two music-industry titans who also happen to still be relevant, are reportedly worth a combined $800 million.
In short, even if U2’s record sales continue to decline from here on out, Bono is still probably going to have enough money for the essentials.
[Image: DailyCeleb]
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