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‘Web of lies’: Mogul stripped of billionaire status

BEVERLY HILLS, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 09: Kylie Jenner attends the 2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Radhika Jones at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on February 09, 2020 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)
BEVERLY HILLS, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 09: Kylie Jenner attends the 2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Radhika Jones at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on February 09, 2020 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)

Less than a year after being declared the youngest-self made billionaire ever, Forbes has stripped makeup mogul Kylie Jenner of her billionaire status.

Forbes said Jenner had inflated the “size and success” of her business, with her AU$880 million (US$587 million) sale earlier this year laying the details bare.

“Earlier this year, Kylie Jenner sold half of her cosmetics company in one of the greatest celebrity cash-outs of all time. But the deal’s fine print reveals that she has been inflating the size and success of her business for years”, Forbes said in an article on Saturday.

The $880 million sale saw Jenner offload 51 per cent of her makeup business to Coty, with a goal of global expansion.

But Forbes, watching the sale, observed how documents released by Coty showed that in the last six months Kylie Cosmetics has been “significantly smaller and less profitable than the family has spent years leading the cosmetics industry and media outlets to believe”.

“Based on this new information — plus the impact of COVID-19 on beauty stocks and consumer spending — Forbes now thinks that Kylie Jenner, even after pocketing an estimated $US340 million after taxes from the sale, is not a billionaire,” it said.

Forbes said Jenner had spun a “web of lies” and accused her and her family of creating tax returns that were “likely forged”.

“A more realistic accounting of her personal fortune puts it at just under US$900 million, despite the headlines surrounding the Coty deal that seemed to confirm her billionaire status. More than a third of that is the estimated $340 million in post-tax cash she would have pocketed from selling a majority of her company,” Forbes said.

Jenner responded on Twitter with a stream of tweets on Saturday morning, asking Forbes for proof of their claims.

“What am I even waking up to? i thought this was a reputable site... all I see are a number of inaccurate statements and unproven assumptions lol. I’ve never asked for any title or tried to lie my way there EVER. Period,” she said.

“‘Even creating tax returns that were likely forged’. That’s your proof? So you just THOUGHT they were forged? Like actually what am I reading.”

“I can name a list of 100 things more important right now than fixating on how much money I have.”

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