Kanye West’s wealth has taken a huge hit in recent years after a series of reckless outbursts saw brands including Adidas and Gap sever ties with the rapper
Kanye West, who is as famous for his wife Bianca Censori’s bold fashion statements as his chart-topping music, has seen his wealth take a hit due to his unpredictable and often controversial rants. The rapper, who longed to be recognised by Forbes as a billionaire, achieved this goal in 2020, even providing journalists with documents to verify his net worth.
Last night, Censori grabbed attention once more with a nearly-naked stunt on the Grammy awards red carpet. West’s fortune, which once soared to an estimated $2 billion (£1.6 bn), was boosted significantly by his partnerships with brands like Adidas, alongside his music sales. Even after making it onto Forbes’ list, West expressed dissatisfaction, angrily texting a Forbes editor: “It’s $3.3 billion (£2.66bn) since no one at Forbes knows how to count.”
Showbiz rivalry
In the realm of celebrity wealth, West has also been preoccupied with Taylor Swift’s financial ascent – she’s currently the world’s second-richest musician with a net worth of about $1.6 bn (£1.3 bn). In a track from his 2024 album ‘Vultures 1’, a collaboration with Dollar Sign, West mentions Swift, boasting that he’s earned six times more than her.
At one point, he may have been wealthier than Taylor Swift, but less than three years after first appearing on the Forbes list, West’s fortune took a massive hit when Adidas severed all ties with him – absorbing a reported $535 million (£430m) loss in the process. Several other brands, including Gap and Balenciaga, also cut their ties to West around the same time, reports the Mirror US.
Offensive outbursts
The fallout was triggered by a series of antisemitic social media posts by the rapper. The controversy began in 2022, when he suggested in an Instagram post that fellow-rapper P Diddy was “controlled” by Jews.
Instagram responded by locking his account, but West doubled down, reactivating his Twitter account to announce that he was “going death con 3” on Jewish people. In subsequent media interviews, West repeatedly voiced his belief in various conspiracy theories about Jewish people.
Despite a huge backlash from fans, he claimed on an October 2022 episode of the Drink Champs podcast “I can say antisemitic s***, and Adidas cannot drop me.”He was mistaken. That same month, Adidas announced that their partnership with West was over. The company admitted that around $535 million of forecasted operating profit would be wiped off the books – largely due to a mountain of unsold Kanye West-branded stock.
Fortune plummets
Kanye West’s recent controversies have hit his wallet hard, wiping a colossal $1.5 bn (£1.2 bn) from his fortune and booting him off Forbes’ list of the World’s Billionaires. He hasn’t tried to mend fences with Adidas, even accusing them of trying to “intimidate and oppress” him and claiming their designers nicked his ideas.
Despite this, he ditched reported plans to controversially name his new album after Adolf Hitler and went on to share a Hebrew apology to the Jewish community on Instagram. With these moves, Forbes now pegs his net worth at around $400m (£315m), counting his properties, music sales, and his slice of ex-wife Kim Kardashian’s shapewear empire.