First Up: The Royal Firm Is a $28 Billion Empire
According to Forbes, the monarchy controls over $28 billion in assets through the Firm (which is officially known as “Monarchy PLC”). A quick inventory of its many assets: The Crown Estate is worth $19.5 billion, Buckingham Palace is worth $4.9 billion, the Duchy of Cornwall is worth $1.3 billion, the Duchy of Lancaster is worth $748 million, Kensington Palace is worth $630 million, and the Crown Estate Scotland is worth $592 million.
The Crown Estate technically belongs to the ruling monarch (in this case, King Charles) for the life of their reign, but it is neither their private nor government property. It is instead managed by an outside board. According to Forbes, the Crown Estate produced £475 million in profits in 2020, of which the royal family received 25% (known as the Sovereign Grant), and the remaining 75% went to the British Treasury. That funding equaled an astounding £86.3 million in only one year!! So, okay, the Queen *did* gain money from the royal institution as a whole, but it’s kind of pointless because she also had a completely different set of assets that were just hers.
The Queen Had $500 Million in Personal Assets
Personal interests “mostly in British blue-chip shares,” a truly large art collection, an equally massive jewelry collection, and real properties including Sandringham House and Balmoral Castle were among the assets mentioned.
Plus, She Inherited Her Mother’s Entire Estate
The Queen Mother left the Queen an estimated £70 million fortune, including several famous things of art. Despite this, Her Majesty determined that the most significant artifacts left by her mother would be transferred to the Royal Collection and “held in trust for the nation.”
The Queen Owned a Wildly Expensive Stamp Collection
According to the Sunday Times, the Queen possessed the Royal Philatelic Collection, which is worth £100 million and consists of stamps from the United Kingdom and Commonwealth stamps.
There Are Claims She Was Trying to Hide Her Wealth
The Guardian published a shocking article in February 2021 saying that Queen Elizabeth II “successfully lobbied the government to change a draft law in order to conceal her ’embarrassing’ private wealth from the public.” This allegedly happened in the 1970s and “placed a veil of secrecy over the Queen’s private shareholdings and investments until at least 2011.”
However, a representative for Buckingham Palace told The Sun that “any assertion that the sovereign has blocked legislation is simply incorrect.”
In any case, the Queen left her family a genuine fortune.