Will Jerry Hall get a piece of Rupert Murdoch's $17bn fortune? Media mogul, 91, to divorce fourth wife
Rupert Murdoch, 91, and Jerry Hall, 65, are readying to end their marriage. The media mogul billionaire and the supermodel are getting divorced after six years of marriage, The New York Times reported on June 22, citing two people with knowledge of the decision. The divorce would be a fourth for Murdoch, 91, and a first for Hall, 65, who was previously in a relationship with Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger.
Murdoch and Hall's split seems unlikely to alter the ownership structure of businesses such as Fox News the Wall Street Journal in the US, and The Sun and The Times in the UK as either The Murdoch family trust holds each company, with Murdoch splitting voting rights with his four oldest children — Lachlan, Elisabeth, James, and Prudence or maintaining control. Murdoch met Hall in Australia in 2015. Hall who hails from Texas, was one of the most well-known fashion models of the 1970s and 1980s. Hall was performing in the play 'The Graduate'. The couple were introduced by Penny Fowler, Murdoch’s niece. After weeks of speculation, the couple went public at the rugby world cup final at Twickenham in London that October. Murdoch was photographed kissing Hall on the cheek while she smiled broadly. They made their first red carpet appearance together at the Golden Globes in 2016.
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Murdoch and Hall married in 2016 in a private ceremony in St Bride’s church in London having met a year earlier, after which Rupert tweeted, "No more tweets for ten days or ever! Feel like the luckiest AND happiest man in the world." The ceremony was a week before Murdoch’s 85th birthday and guests included Bob Geldof, Sir Michael Caine, and Rebekah Brooks, chief executive of Murdoch’s newspaper stable News UK. It came after a five-month courtship with the former supermodel Hall, who previously dated the Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger for more than 20 years. Hall has four children with Jagger- Georgia May Jagger, Elizabeth Jagger, James Jagger, and Gabriel Jagger. Hall had married Jagger but when they split, they annulled their marriage. The pair tied the knot in a Hindu wedding ceremony in Bali, Indonesia, in 1990. The marriage was annulled less than a decade later in London's High Court of Justice.
No more tweets for ten days or ever! Feel like the luckiest AND happiest man in world.
— Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) March 4, 2016
The news of the split does come as a surprise to the friends close to the couple as up until 2019, Murdoch and Hall often attended red carpet events together, including the Tribeca Festival premiere of The Quiet One and Vanity Fair's Oscars after-party that year. More recently, in 2021, Murdoch and Hall celebrated his 90th birthday at a party in New York City, and looked very much comfortable with each other.
Murdoch was previously married to Wendi Murdoch, mother of their daughters Chloe Murdoch and Grace Murdoch before they divorced in 2014. The News Corp chairman also shares children Elizabeth Murdoch, James Murdoch, and Lachlan Murdoch with his second wife Anna Murdoch Mann, who he split from in 1999 after 32 years of marriage. Additionally, he is dad to daughter Prudence Murdoch with his first wife Patricia Booker. The duo wed in 1956 and divorced in 1967.
Will Rupert Murdoch share his $17bn fortune with Jerry Hall?
Murdoch, who is the CEO and Chairman of media group News Corp, has a whopping fortune of $17billion. It is not known whether Murdoch and Hall had signed a pre-nuptial agreement. Murdoch’s businesses include Sky TV and the Sun and Times newspapers. He also owns US television network Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, along with several ventures in his native Australia. News of the couple’s divorce comes just seven months after it was revealed that they had purchased a $200 million 340,000-acre cattle ranch in Montana.
It is unclear how much of the media giant's $17billion fortune may go to Hall. Lawyer Mark Stephens, of the Howard Kennedy firm, said Murdoch may have signed a ‘fairly generous’ pre-nuptial agreement. At the time of their wedding in 2016 it was speculated that she may inherit part of the assets owned individually by her then 84-year-old husband. He personally owned 0.5 per cent of the shares in 21st Century Fox at the time.
However, properties the couple have acquired since marrying may be at stake. In 2019, they bought a $13.8 million Georgian property near Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire, England. A year later, they bought the Great Tew Manor – a ‘doer-upper’ in the rural Cotswolds in England which was earmarked for a $37million restoration project. Last December the couple spent $279 million on a 340,000-acre cattle ranch near Yellowstone Park in the US, as reported by NewsFeed.
Hall made a fortune from her career as a model, becoming the face of brands such as Revlon cosmetics. She also had small roles in films including Batman. Her split from Mick Jagger left her with an estimated settlement of up to $22 million.