23-11-2008, 10:55 PM
High cost of divorce looms over billionaire Bernie
<span style="color:#FF0000">The unlikely marriage of the diminutive Formula One boss and his Amazonian wife may soon be over.<!--sizec--><!--/sizec-->
By Andy McSmith (The Independent)
Saturday, 15 November 2008
Slavica Ecclestone, wife of the Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone, has moved out of their £10m Chelsea home, setting off speculation yesterday that a hugely expensive divorce case is in the offing. She left the weekend that Lewis Hamilton secured the world championship at the Brazilian grand prix. She is now reported to be living in a flat by the Thames, owned by the boyfriend of their 19-year-old daughter, Petra.
If the Ecclestone marriage has broken down, it could produce one of the largest divorce settlements in history. Mr Ecclestone, a self-made man, is reputed to have accumulated £2.4bn from the television rights and other spin-offs from Formula One. But he has made over the bulk of his huge fortune to his wife, who is not domiciled in the UK for tax purposes. When he made £1.9bn from a bond issue in 1999, the money was put in off-shore trusts controlled by Slavica.
The couple married 24 years ago, and have always seemed an unlikely team. She is a Croatian-born former Armani model; he is the son of a North Sea trawler skipper, who left school to work at a gasworks at the age of 16. The age gap between them is 28 years. When they first met, at the 1982 Italian Grand Prix, two years before they married, he was 52 and she was 24. There is also a 10in gap in their heights, he being 5ft 4in, and she is 6ft 2in.
:laugh:
<span style="color:#FF0000">The unlikely marriage of the diminutive Formula One boss and his Amazonian wife may soon be over.<!--sizec--><!--/sizec-->
By Andy McSmith (The Independent)
Saturday, 15 November 2008
Slavica Ecclestone, wife of the Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone, has moved out of their £10m Chelsea home, setting off speculation yesterday that a hugely expensive divorce case is in the offing. She left the weekend that Lewis Hamilton secured the world championship at the Brazilian grand prix. She is now reported to be living in a flat by the Thames, owned by the boyfriend of their 19-year-old daughter, Petra.
If the Ecclestone marriage has broken down, it could produce one of the largest divorce settlements in history. Mr Ecclestone, a self-made man, is reputed to have accumulated £2.4bn from the television rights and other spin-offs from Formula One. But he has made over the bulk of his huge fortune to his wife, who is not domiciled in the UK for tax purposes. When he made £1.9bn from a bond issue in 1999, the money was put in off-shore trusts controlled by Slavica.
The couple married 24 years ago, and have always seemed an unlikely team. She is a Croatian-born former Armani model; he is the son of a North Sea trawler skipper, who left school to work at a gasworks at the age of 16. The age gap between them is 28 years. When they first met, at the 1982 Italian Grand Prix, two years before they married, he was 52 and she was 24. There is also a 10in gap in their heights, he being 5ft 4in, and she is 6ft 2in.
:laugh:
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I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant....
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I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant....
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