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- Françoise Bettencourt Meyers was the first woman to ever hit a $100 billion net worth.
- She inherited a one-third stake in L'Oréal from her mother.
- She had a fraught relationship with her mother, even filing a criminal complaint against her.
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Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, the 70-year-old granddaughter of L'Oréal founder Eugène Schueller, is the richest woman in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Bettencourt Meyers is worth around $100 billion, mostly due to her stake in L'Oreal, the world's biggest cosmetics maker with sales of about $44 billion in 2023. She's the first woman to reach such a sizeable net worth.
Though her wealth has fallen $658 million year-to-date, she's still in the 14th spot on the Bloomberg list.
Here's a look at her life and wealth.
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Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, 70, is the granddaughter of L'Oreal founder Eugène Schueller.
Schueller, a pharmacist, founded the company that was to become L'Oreal in 1909.
His daughter and Bettencourt Meyers' mother, Liliane, inherited Schueller's fortune and control of the company upon his death in 1957.
Along with her husband, André Bettencourt, a French politician, the Bettencourts were well known in France for theirglamorous parties.
But Bettencourt Meyers was less interested in the socialite lifestyle of her parents, preferring to stay in and play the piano or read,Vanity Fairreported.
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Bettencourt Meyers had a fraught relationship with her mother.
Their mother-daughter relationship was strained ever since Bettencourt Meyers was a teenager.
"Françoise was heavy and slow," Bettencourt once said, perVanity Fair. "Always one lap behind me."
Bettencourt also called Françoise "a cold child" in an interview with a French newspaper, perThe New York Times.
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As an adult, Bettencourt Meyers chose to focus on her career as an author.
The heiress has written books on topics ranging from Greek mythology to Judaism and Catholicism.
Her most recent book, a Biblical commentary entitled "Regard sur la Bible," was published in 2008, according to itsAmazonpage.
Bettencourt Meyers also sits on L'Oréal's board and chairs the family's holding company.
Bettencourt Meyers has a 35% stake in L'Oréal. She has been a director since 1997 and vice chair of the board since 2020, according to the company.
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Her relationship with her mother came to a tipping point when Bettencourt Meyers initiated a decade-long family feud over her inheritance.
In the lawsuit, Bettencourt Meyers alleged that photographer François-Marie Banier used his friendship with Liliane Bettencourt to manipulate the elderly heiress into giving him some 1.3 billion euros ($1.4 billion) of cash, art, and life insurance policies, The New York Times reported in 2009.
Bettencourt, who was diagnosed with dementia, disputed her daughter's assertion, and said she freely shared her assets with Banier.
In a 2008 letter to Banier, Bettencourt described their relationship to him, writing: "With you, I am like a mother, a lover, all the feelings pass through me. It makes me tremble," according to Vanity Fair.
Bettencourt Meyers told a French news magazine in 2009 that Mr. Banier's "objective is clear: break away my mother from our family to profit from her. I will not let it happen."
The case went to trial in 2015. Bainer was convicted of "abus de faiblesse," or "abuse of weakness."
He was sentenced to two and half years in prison and told to pay Bettencourt 158 million euros in damages.
The jail sentence and payment were later reversed in an appeal.
In 2023, Netflix released a three-part documentary titled "The Billionaire, The Butler, and The Boyfriend" about the family drama.
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The pair weren't on speaking terms after Bettencourt Meyers filed the criminal complaint in 2009.
"I don't see my daughter anymore and I don't wish to," Bettencourt said in a 2008 interview, according to Vanity Fair. "For me, my daughter has become something inert."
A lawyer involved in the case told Vanity Fair: "The mother massacred the daughter, then the daughter massacred the mother."
In 2011, Bettencourt was placedunder the guardianship of her familydue to concerns over her declining mental health.
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The lawsuit also drudged up long-forgotten family secrets, including speculation that Bettencourt Meyer's father André and her grandfather were Nazi sympathizers.
Bettencourt Meyers' grandfather, Eugène Schueller, had publicly commended Adolf Hitler's "dynamism" in the early years of Nazi Germany and was investigated as a Nazi collaborator after World War II ended.
Schueller was also a member of a secret society that plotted to overthrow France's republican government in the 1930s.The group, which was linked to multiple murders and bombings, was bankrolled by Schueller, who hosted its meetings at L'Oréal's headquarters.
André Bettencourt, Bettencourt Meyers' father,wrote anti-Semitic diatribes for the pro-German press during the war, according to Time,though he switched his allegiances and joined the Resistance. He was laterdecorated for his military serviceduring World War II and went on to serve in the French government.
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Even though she was on the winning side of the lawsuit, Bettencourt Meyers was later investigated for allegations of bribing a witness.
The investigation stemmed from a criminal complaint filed by Banier in 2015, according to Vanity Fair. At the time, Bettencourt Meyers said the payment she made to the witness was part severance payment and part personal loan, not a bribe for the testimony.
That suit and Bettencourt Meyers' countersuit against Banier were resolved in a secret plea deal in 2016, Vanity Fair reported.
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Bettencourt Meyers inherited tens of billions of dollars when her mother died in 2017, and valuable assets like this mansion in the suburbs of Paris ...
The house is located in Neuilly-sur-Seine, a wealthy suburb west of Paris. Neuilly-sur-Seine is known in France as "power suburb, a place not only of wealth but influence," according to The Independent. Over the years, it's been home to actors like Christian Clavier, Thierry Lhermitte, and Gerard Jugnot, and politician Marine Le Pen.
The Art Deco mansion and is where Bettencourt spent her final days, Time reported.
... and this mansion overlooking France's Brittany coast.
The mansion was one of Bettencourt's childhood homes, The New York Times reported.
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Bettencourt Meyers lived in this nearby home.
French police searched this home in 2010 as a part of the investigations surrounding the Bettencourt affair, Bloomberg reported at the time.
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Bettencourt Meyers lived there with her husband Jean-Pierre Meyers.
Jean-Pierre Meyers is CEO of the Bettencourt Meyers family's holding company, Téthys.
The couple has two adult sons, Jean-Victor and Nicolas, both of whom are on L'Oreal's board of directors along with Bettencourt Meyers.
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In 2023, Bettencourt Meyers became the first woman to reach a $100 billion fortune.
Bettencourt Meyers is worth around $100 billion, Bloomberg estimates, making her the world's wealthiest woman and the 14th richest person.
She's been the world's richest woman for five of the last six years, according to Forbes.
She and her family control about a third of L'Oréal, whichowns mass-market brands like Maybelline, Essie, Garnier, and, of course, L'Oréal, as well as high-end beauty companies like Urban Decay, Lancôme, and Kiehl's. L'Oréal also licenses the beauty divisions of luxury fashion houses including Yves Saint Laurent and Valentino.
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Bettencourt Meyers has dedicated some of her billions to philanthropy.
In April 2019 she was among several French billionaires who pledged millions after the famous Notre Dame Cathedral caught fire.
Bettencourt Meyers is also the president of the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation, the charity she and her parents founded in 1987. It issues grants to support research in the life sciences and arts projects, according to its website.
In 2023, it gave 68.6 million euros, or roughly $74 million, in grants.
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