MrBeast, 2023’s highest-earning creator, has hit back against claims that he is, er, wealthy. As reported by Variety, he makes $82 million a year — more than double any digital creator, and according to the South China Morning Post, he has an estimated net worth of half a billion USD.
With figures like that, you’d be forgiven for assuming that the creator, real name Jimmy Donaldson, is pretty well off. But in a new interview with Time Magazine, the creator explains that he doesn’t think so.
In the interview, the 25-year-old claimed that he took home between $600 million and $700 million a year — but is adamant that this doesn’t make him rich.
“I mean, not right now,” he maintained. “I’m not naive; maybe one day.”
His infamously big-budget videos, he explained, make millions to make. “Each video does a couple million in ad revenue, a couple million in brand deals.”
But the reason he doesn’t consider himself rich is because, according to him, every penny is re-invested. “I’ve reinvested everything to the point of—you could claim—stupidity, just believing that we would succeed,” he said. “And it’s worked out.”
In the profile, Time also mentions how Donaldson has a live-in chef and personal trainer, while the New York Post claims he lives in a 300,000-square-foot home and bought out the whole neighborhood for his employees. But even if he was rich, he has no idea, because he doesn’t even access his money.
“I don’t have access to any of my bank accounts,” he added. “I have a CFO and everything, but [my mom is] the one who has access to the master bank account.”
If this lifestyle is something Donaldson claims doesn’t make him rich, then to hell with it — I want to be ‘not rich’ too.
