MAMMA MIA! POP GROUP ABBA WORTH $1bn
In our fortnightly celebrity investment and wealth round-up, Martha Stewart joins NFT craze, writes Keith J Fernandez
Abba
Swedish pop group Abba certainly do not need the money, so their comeback may actually be all about the music. Together, the awesome foursome have a net worth of more than $1 billion, with each member’s fortune estimated at between $200 million and $300 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth.
Having sold about 400 million albums over the decades, Abba’s net worth places them slightly behind The Beatles. Royalties account for a significant percentage of their wealth, with a major share thought to come from their work as Abba.
As a movie producer and composer of musicals, Bjorn Ulvaeus has a net worth of $300m. He has an extensive property portfolio across Europe, in addition to the homes he shares with his wife Lena Kallersjo in Sweden.
Anni-Frid Lyngstad’s wealth is also estimated at $300m and derives from her work with Abba, as well as earnings from her solo career.
Benny Andersson, who co-produced Chess and Mamma Mia! with Ulvaeus, has a fortune of about $230m, including earnings from Abba and his traditional Swedish band, the Benny Andersson Orkester, as well as from writing music for films and TV.
Agnetha Faltskog’s net worth is about $200m, which comes mostly from earnings from Abba and her solo music career.
The band is certainly well off enough to have turned down several lucrative reunion offers over the years. In 2000, a British-American consortium offered Abba, which broke up in 1982, $1bn to perform 100 shows around the world, but they turned it down.
At the time, Lyngstad said: “No amount of money would change our minds. Maybe we sometimes say it would be good to do a song together again, just a recording and nothing else, but I don’t know if that will happen – so don’t say that we will.”
Abba’s latest song, Just a Notion, was released on Friday, the band’s third release after the chart-topping Don’t Shut Me Down and I Still Have Faith In You, were released in September. All three tracks will appear on Abba Voyage, their first album in more than 40 years, which will be released in November.
Ashton Kutcher
Disruptive business backer Ashton Kutcher has expanded his investment portfolio with new forays into cultivated meat production and paediatric health services.
Earlier this month, the actor participated in a Series B funding round totalling $219m in telehealth start-up Elemy. The US-based venture provides inhome and online care services for children with autism and other behavioural health conditions. The investment vaulted Elemy to unicorn status with a valuation of $1.15bn.
The That ’70s Show actor participated in the funding round alongside talent manager Guy Oseary through their Sound Ventures company. The round, led by SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2, Goodwater Capital and Premji Invest, drew additional investments from Amity Ventures, Avidity Partners, Chelsea Clinton’s Metrodora Ventures and Whale Rock Capital.
Set up in 2020 under the name Sprout Therapy, Elemy offers autism diagnosis and in-home behavioural therapy support in more than 30 cities across the US.
Also this month, a collective led by Kutcher, Mr Oseary and their Sound Ventures colleague Effie Epstein announced a partnership with MeaTech 3D to hasten the Israeli start-up’s growth in developing and commercialising its proprietary cultured meat production technology.
MeaTech positions itself as a sustainable alternative to industrialised animal farming and has developed alternative protein cell lines for beef, chicken and other meats.
Their total investment was not disclosed. The investors will also support MeaTech with business development and marketing, Kutcher said.
MeaTech began operations in 2019 and is based in Ness Ziona, Israel, with a subsidiary in Antwerp, Belgium. The company focuses on bioprinting premium, centre-of-plate meat products such as structured marbled steaks.
Kutcher, 43, may not have had a major film outing since 2013’s Jobs – notwithstanding Netflix’s The Ranch – but he has, nevertheless, built an enviable investment portfolio.
As one of Hollywood’s most famous side hustlers, the actor is estimated to have a net worth in excess of $200m, thanks to investments through Sound Ventures and its predecessor, A-Grade Investments, which he formed with Mr Oseary in 2010.
A-Grade has invested in high-flying start-ups such as Uber, Shazam, Spotify, SoundCloud and Airbnb.
Martha Stewart
Businesswoman and TV star Martha Stewart is homing in on the craze for non-fungible tokens (NFTs) with the launch of a digital boutique, Fresh Mint, on martha.com.
The inaugural collection, which Stewart curated in collaboration with top artists, photographers and designers, features a dozen Halloween-themed pieces and was launched in partnership with NFT provider Tokns Commerce.
The move has proved a success. Several art pieces priced between $66 and $266 were marked “sold out” within hours of going live on October 19.
Others, such as photographs of Stewart in Halloween outfits or pumpkin portraits of the home interiors star, are open for auction bids until October 31. As of the first day, they had already received bids ranging from one to three Ether, or between about $3,812 and $11,437 at that day’s exchange rates.
“I have been so fortunate to collaborate with talented artists, creators and entrepreneurs throughout my life. I see NFTs as a new canvas for creativity and blockchain as a vehicle to protect artists’ IP and support their incredible work,” Stewart says. “By collaborating with Tokns, we reached an approach that feels authentic and aligned with my vision.”
Stewart, 80, was once a billionaire but her net worth is now estimated at $400m.
The former Chanel model and stockbroker made her fortune by taking her media and merchandising company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, public in 1999.
The initial public offering raised $1.9bn, with the stock reaching a record high of $39.75 a share the following day, according to ABC News.
Salman Khan
Over in Bollywood, Salman Khan is moving into the NFT space with endorsements and tokens of his own. Earlier this week, the A-list actor tweeted the launch of static NFTs using a new token, Bollycoin, on a marketplace of the same name.
Seven million Bollycoin were sold within five days of launch, the company said in a Twitter post. As of October 19, 1 Bolly equals $0.10.
Khan has also been named brand ambassador of $Gari, an Indian cryptocurrency token that was unveiled earlier this month. The token, launched by short video app Chingari, will be available on its own NFT marketplace.
The token has been developed in collaboration with the Solana blockchain and is being positioned as a social token rather than a financial one, with users able to accumulate coins based on their content and merchandise.
“The creators are shaping the future of entertainment,” Khan says. “With the incorporation of the $Gari reward programme, the creators will further get motivated to create newer and more engaging videos on the Chingari app. It is going to be an interesting journey hereon.”
Khan, 55, is thought to be worth $260m, although previous estimates have put that figure above $300m. His wealth principally comes from acting and production credits, as well as endorsement deals.
Khaby Lame
Silence is golden but staying quiet has helped Khaby Lame to amass a net worth of $5m, according to Celebrity Net Worth. Considered the most popular man on TikTok with 116 million followers, he shot to fame and fortune during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Lame, 21, lost his job at a factory near Turin when Italy first went into lockdown last year and started tinkering with TikTok from his parents’ bedroom soon after.
While his early videos were in the same vein as others on the platform, he has achieved popularity with deadpan video responses that personify the term “shaking my head”, or SMH in internet slang.
The Senegalese citizen, who does not have Italian citizenship despite living in the country since the age of one, has cashed in on his fame, earning millions from endorsements, appearance fees and merchandise.
This month alone, he is thought to have earned 20m Indian rupees ($266,975) for an Indian Premier League 2021 advertisement campaign for sports gaming company Dream11. Lame’s web shop currently sells a variety of products including “magic” candles, clothing and kitchen gadgets such as a popcorn machine and a watermelon cutter.