Speculation over exactly how much Donald Trump is worth deepens...
On Tuesday, the "Trump net worth" debate was reopened after the GOP presumptive nominee filed his Personal Financial Disclosure (PFD) forms with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). This was Trump's second annual filing since he announced his candidacy for president on June 16, 2015.
The real estate mogul likewise made a big announcement about the disclosure on his personal website, touting the following earnings:
- A net worth of $10 billion
- An income of $557 million in 2015
- A revenue increase of $190 million in 2015
However, Forbes Media, which has tried to keep tabs on "The Donald's" fortune for over three decades, maintains a very different sum...
Trump Net Worth Is $4.5 Billion, Argues Steve Forbes
Yesterday, Forbes Media CEO Steve Forbes told CNN's "New Day" that Trump's estimated net worth is more like $4.5 billion.
He explained how they arrived at this lower valuation:
"We take the position with him and anyone else that ... your name may have value, but the key thing is: how do you monetize it? When you monetize it, we count it. Oprah? Same thing. Her name has a real brand value but until you monetize it, we don't count it."
Essentially Forbes was saying that Trump assigns a large - and seemingly arbitrary - dollar sum to his personal brand, which shouldn't be counted when one actually calculates net worth value.
Evidence of Trump's more arbitrary method of valuation was present in a form provided by the billionaire last June...
According to Forbes, his real estate items, Trump Tower and 40 Wall Street, were both listed as simply being worth "over $50 million."
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"Rather than include a theoretical value of personal goodwill," Forbes reported yesterday, "[we] capture Trump's brand through the deals he's able to make using his personal cachet and the estimated market value of the company he uses to license the Trump name to the world."
Here is yesterday's full interview between Steve Forbes and CNN's Alysin Camerota on Trump's recent financial disclosure...
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