At just 31-years-old, the Barbadian singer, businesswoman, fashion designer and actress Robyn “Rihanna” Fenty is officially the richest female musician on earth. On Tuesday, 4 June 2019, Forbes dropped a profile on the “Diamonds” songstress, estimating her fortune at around $600 million USD. That puts Riri ahead of fellow superstars Madonna worth $570 million USD, Céline Dion worth $450 million USD and Beyoncé worth $400 million USD.
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According to the media outlet, Riri’s rise to riches is largely due in part to her savvy move into fashion and her partnership with luxury goods giant LVMH. Their collaboration on the singer’s Fenty Beauty, which launched in September 2017 with an expansive array of foundations comprising of 40 different shades, racked up a reported $100 million USD in sales in its first few weeks. And just 15 months in business, the brand is worth an estimated $3 billion USD for LVMH (from which Rihanna has earned $570 million USD.) On top of that Rihanna also co-owns her all-inclusive Savage x Fenty lingerie line with TechStyle Fashion Group. She now has a new clothing line with LVHM, Fenty, which makes her the first woman to create an original brand at LVMH, the first woman of colour at the top of an LVMH maison, and her line will be the first new house created by the group since Christian Lacroix in 1987. “I just want to see things from my perspective. I’m a young black woman who loves and embraces all of the young people’s ideas and energies – I’m so about that,” she said in Paris recently. “It’s about turning all of that into something luxurious for this fashion house.”
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Overall, the “Stay” singer is numbered at 37 on the list of America’s self-made women, which includes Oprah Winfrey, Serena Williams and Kylie Jenner. The list of 80 successful self-made women, ages ranging from 21 to 92, are worth a combined $81.3 billion. Among the 80 women selected, 25 of them are billionaires.
Following on the footsteps of her early mentor Jay Z, who just became the first rap billionaire, Rihanna’s moves are major steps forward for the culture and we are proud of her.
