Counting wasn't a problem for Michael
Jackson in the 1970 hit "ABC." Love,
he chirped in the Jackson 5 song he
co-wrote, was as "easy as 1-2-3." When
it came to handling the bigger sums
the singer would go on to amass,
though, Jackson never really got a
grip on the numbers. Profligate
spending, a slew of legal settlements
and a reliance on ever increasing bank
loans blew a hole in the fortune
Jackson earned over four decades of
performing. Some estimates put the
singer's debt at the time of his death
at $300 million. Others put him almost
twice as far into the red.
(See pictures of people around the
world mourning Michael Jackson.)
That the King of Pop earned royal
sums for his music, there's little
doubt. Jackson pocketed more than $300
million from sales of his recordings
since the early 1980s, according to
The New York Times.
Thriller, which was the
top-selling album of all time until
eclipsed by the Eagles' Greatest
Hits, 1971-1975, brought in a
reported $125 million for the singer
in the years after its release in
1982. Though there were early signs of
an inclination to spend — he
apparently missed out on landing the
bones of John Merrick, better known as
the Elephant Man, despite bidding
about $1 million for them in 1987 —
Jackson showed early investment savvy.
Shelling out $47.5 million in 1985 for
the rights to a catalog of music that
included 251 Beatles songs was a
profitable move. Those rights, as well
as concerts, endorsements and music
videos, would generate more than $400
million over the next two decades.
(See the top 10 Michael Jackson
moments.)
Little else about his finances was
as clever. Blessed with the regular
rewards from the Beatles' music and
his own, Jackson started to spend. He
paid $17 million in 1988 for the
2,800-acre (roughly 1,000 hectares)
ranch in California that would become
Neverland. Maintaining the theme park
— complete with zoo, movie theater and
fairground — swallowed up about $5
million annually. As Jackson gradually
retreated from work, the additional
millions eaten up by plane charters,
antiques, lavish gifts and legal
disputes — a child-molestation case in
the early 1990s cost Jackson around
$20 million to settle — left a hole in
his fortune. To help plug it, in 1995
the singer signed over to Sony a 50%
stake in the rights to the Beatles'
catalog in exchange for almost $100
million.
(Watch TIME's video "Appreciating
Michael Jackson, the Musician.")
Things would get worse. With
sponsors turned off by Jackson's
private life — Pepsi and sneaker brand
LA Gear, for instance, had backed him
— he further lost control of his
finances. Duff investments and a
divorce settlement with Lisa Marie
Presley helped push Jackson to
increasingly use his earnings from
music as collateral for loans, first
from Bank of America (BoA), before
Fortress Investment Group, a
specialist in distressed debt, took
the loans off BoA's hands. By the
mid-2000s, Jackson was believed to be
$270 million in debt.
(See Thriller's entry on the
All-TIME 100 Albums.)
With annual income from the sale of
his and his catalog's music at around
$19 million, according to the Wall
Street Journal, Jackson was
still stretched. When the singer
defaulted on a loan in March last
year, pushing Neverland into
foreclosure, private-equity firm
Colony Capital stepped in to bail him
out. The 50 concerts planned for
London later this year could have
netted Jackson as much as $100
million, with a possible world tour to
follow generating five times that
amount. To Jackson's debtors, if not
to the singer himself, that sure would
have added up.
Read "A Pop Icon's Death: The Talent
and the Tragedy."
See pictures of Michael Jackson's
famous friends at LIFE.com.
