'Tis the season to be jolly spend literally all your money buying presents while your bank account weeps and dies a slow death. So, like, on the off-chance that you need someone else's raging success to inspire you, allow me to present the living legend known as Oprah Winfrey. She has something she'd like to say to you!
Wow, inspiring. Anyway, Oprah's net worth is literally massive and the time has come to copy every decision she's ever made in life, so let's get started:
The Oprah Winfrey Show
Oprah's iconic talk show ran for 25 glorious seasons before ending in 2011, and she made so. much. money. Details of her exact paycheck aren't known, but Forbes reported that she earned an estimated $165 million or P8.4 billion (not just from the show, mind you) between May 2011 and May 2012, and earned $290 million (P14.7 billion) the year before.
While we're all sad Oprah is no longer giving away cars to entire audiences (YOU GET A CAR! AND YOU GET A CAR!), don't forget that she still has her own magazine!
Weight Watchers
Oprah has a stake in Weight Watchers (er...WW? I guess?), and not to be dramatic but holy f*ck has it paid off. According to CNBC, the company's share prices hit record highs in June 2018, making Oprah major money. No, seriously, Forbes says her shares have gone from $43.5 million (P2.2 billion) to $400 million (P20.3 billion). I...just...wow.
The OWN Network
Gentle reminder that Oprah has her own damn network (sorry, her OWN damn network). The business side of things is a little complicated, but basically Oprah's company, Harpo Inc., owns OWN with Discovery Communications. They paid Harpo $70 million (P3.5 billion) in 2017 to increase their ownership to over 70 percent, and according to Deadline, this was the first time Oprah "received a payment from her company's ownership stake in OWN in the 10 years since forming the joint venture with Discovery."
This might seem surprising, but despite OWN's major success right now, it had a pretty rocky start and "raked in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses before starting to turn profit."
Harpo Inc.
Oprah's company Harpo (yes, that's Oprah spelled backwards) is literally the force behind Dr. Phil, Rachael Ray *and* The Dr. Oz Show. Meaning Oprah is making money from shows she's not even on. HER POWER.
Real Estate
According to CNBC, Oprah owns a $50 million (P2.5 billion) mansion in California, a $14 million (P709 million) ski chalet in Colorado, and an $8 million (P405 million) estate in Orcas Island. So, if she ever loses those billions, she can always sell one of her homes!
^ Her view, tho.
So, what's her net worth?
In 2018, Oprah was named one of the richest people in the world by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index (via CNBC) who put her net worth at around $4 billion (P203 billion). But in 2019, Forbes claimed she was worth $2.7 billion (P137 billion), so who knows what to believe, honestly. Either way, she's a MULTI-billionaire, so doubt she's counting!
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This article originally appeared on Cosmopolitan.com. Minor edits have been made by the Cosmo.ph editors.
