Adam Neumann has been kicked out of the billionaire’s club.
Forbes has slashed the estimated net worth of WeWork’s long-haired cofounder to $600 million from $4.1 billion, following a botched IPO attempt that saw Neumann ousted as chief executive of the struggling office-sharing company.
Forbes calculated the steep discount by adding up his $500 million stake in WeWork with the $500 million he has profited from stock sales, and subtracting the nearly $400 million in debt he disclosed in the IPO filing of WeWork’s parent We Co.
We Co., in which Neuman holds an 18 percent stake, reportedly slashed its valuation to between $10 billion and $20 billion ahead of the fizzled IPO. But Forbes estimates that We Co. is worth “at most” $2.8 billion.
The rock-bottom assessment is “based on a multiple of the company’s revenues consistent with publicly traded competitor IWG,” and takes into account recent asset sales and “potential cash flow crunch,” Forbes said.
The 40-year-old Neumann, who first appeared on the list in 2016 with a net worth of $1.5 billion, had famously bragged of his ambition of becoming the world’s first trillionaire.
That now looks like an iffy prospect at best, as Neumann recently made headlines for alleged self-dealing, erratic behavior and drug use — including a report of a trans-Atlantic private jet trip last summer after which the crew found a “sizable chunk” of marijuana hidden in a cereal box on board.
Neumann, who remains We’s chairman, has a habit of spending lavishly. He and his wife Rebekah have spent close to $90 million on properties, according to the Wall Street Journal, including a sprawling Hamptons estate, a 60-acre compound in Westchester and a four-condo mega-residence off Gramercy Park.
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