NEW YORK, Sept 7 — Pop star, actress and entrepreneur Selena Gomez is officially in the billionaires club.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Gomez made her debut in the list at an estimated worth of US$1.3 billion (RM5.63 billion).
Unlike her friend Taylor Swift who has reached billionaire status largely from her music and touring, Gomez made her money from a mix of businesses that leverage her talent and hundreds of millions of social media followers.
The 32-year-old rose to fame from her humble beginnings as a 9-year-old as part of the cast of Barney & Friends before moving on to opportunities with Disney Channel, before embarking on a music career.
Since then, she’s gone on to create her own beauty brand and now stars in an Emmy-nominated Hulu show.
The bulk of Gomez’s wealth is tied to Rare Beauty Brands Inc., the makeup line that she started five years ago and has become a hit with influencers and teens — apart from her brand partnerships, acting deals and a mental-health startup.
Representatives for Gomez didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Bloomberg’s wealth analysis took into account the estimated value of her stake in Rare Beauty, her interest in Wondermind, the estimated value of her music album sales and properties, and earnings from streaming deals, brand partnerships, concert tickets and acting.
The study assumes the lowest estimated value of her stakes in businesses and is based only on assets that could be confirmed or traced from publicly disclosed figures.
Despite earning her early millions from her acting, Gomez’s worth skyrocketed with her music career, first with the pop-rock band Selena Gomez & the Scene and then as a solo artist.
With three studio albums and 44 singles, she leveraged her fame on social media with 424 million followers — a number that only lags behind the likes of football legends Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi as the most popular person on Instagram.
Apart from her own brand, numerous others signed her on for eye-watering deals — such as Puma SE (two year-deal worth a reported RM 130 million in 2017) Coach in 2016 (RM43.3 million) and Louis Vuitton (RM43 million)
While she may be best known as a singer, her actual music-related income pales in comparison to her other sources of revenue.
Music tours only accounted for less than 5% of Gomez’s wealth, with album and record sales less than 2%.
She hasn’t toured since 2016, when she abruptly canceled her Revival tour after 55 shows, citing mental health struggles.
That still earned her RM130 million in ticket sales.
Most of Gomez’s fortune — roughly US$1.1 billion (RM4.7 billion) — comes from her stake in Rare Beauty, which she has kept largely independent, with the only known investors in Nikki Eslami’s New Theory Ventures and CEO Scott Friedman, who previously led Nyx Cosmetics.
The Bloomberg analysis assumes Gomez holds a 51% majority interest based on her founding role in the company.
In March, Bloomberg reported that Gomez hired advisers to weigh selling Rare Beauty at a US$2 billion (RM8.66 billion) valuation though she later told Time that she has no plans to sell.
Gomez and her team launched the brand in 2020 for simple, moderately priced makeup.
Rare’s annual revenue reached US$350 million (1.5 billion) last year, according to Pitchbook, topping other celebrity-founded brands such as Jessica Alba’s Honest Co. and Haus Labs by Lady Gaga.
Gomez co-founded Wondermind with her mother, Hollywood producer Mandy Teefey, and Daniella Pierson, the founder of pop culture newsletter The Newsette.
The platform — which includes mental-health tools, interviews and a newsletter — was valued at US$100 million (RM433 million) in 2022 with investments from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital and tennis icon Serena Williams’s venture fund, Serena Ventures.
Gomez is now focusing on her role as Mabel Mora on Only Murders in the Building, which co-stars Steve Martin and Martin Short and started its fourth season on Aug. 27.
She takes home at least US$6 million (RM26 million) per season from the show and is up for an Emmy award for lead actress in a comedy series later this month.
