Bill and Melinda Gates officially divorce, court documents show

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Bill and Melinda Gates officially divorce, court documents show

Bill and Melinda Gates are divorced officially, Fox Business can confirm.

According to court documents, the couple's marriage of 27 years is officially over in the eyes of the law. In docs obtained by Fox Business, a judge signed off on their divorce Monday, putting an end to the scandal that began when they announced their split in May of 2021.

In identical tweets that at the time Microsoft co-founder, 65, and his wife, 56, said they had decided to end their marriage. However, at the time they were told that they planned to continue working together at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundations, the largest charitable foundation in the world.

We raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works all around the world to enable individuals to lead healthy, productive lives, they said in a statement. We ask for privacy and space with our family when we begin to navigate this new life.

The Gates had married in Hawaii in 1994 and shared three children together. They met after she began working as a product manager at Microsoft in 1987. While they announced their separation in May, it is believed they were separate before that.

Court documents obtained by Fox Business at the time had shown that Melinda filed for divorce and stated in the petition that their marriage was irretrievably broken. The documents also revealed that Gateses don't have a separation agreement in place, but stated that they would divide their assets according to a prenuptial arrangement.

Since Bill Gates was once the world's richest man, with an estimated net worth of $130.5 billion his assets were large as they entered into separation agreement discussions. It was reported later in May that the duo had beefed up their legal teams specifically. However, it seems now that they were able to reach an amicable agreement in less than two months.

The exact details of their deal remain a mystery, however it was previously reported that Melinda was given hugely lucrative stock transfers. She acquired a 4.9% stake, and a 6.7% stake. As of Wednesday's close, the shares of Coca-Cola Femsa were valued about $121 million and the Grupo Televisa shares were worth about $386 million.

That transfer brought Melinda's total to close to $2.4 billion, following transfers of about 14 million shares of Canadian National Railway and more than 2.9 million shares of the AutoNation for more than 15 million share matters.