The Forbes Five: Meet Hip-Hop's Wealthiest Artists 2014

According to Forbes, Diddy, Dr Dre, Jay Z, Birdman and 50 cent are the
richest Hip Hop artists in the world currently...in that order. Didddy
is now worth $700million. Wow! See the full report below...

Back in 2007, Sean "Diddy" Combs teamed with Jay Z and 50 Cent to
create a song titled "I Get Money: Forbes 1-2-3 Billion Dollar Remix."
Less than a decade later, rappers are closing in on ten-figure
fortunes, and he's the nearest of the bunch.

Diddy leads the pack with an estimated fortune of $700 million, an
increase of $120 million over his net worth last year. The change
comes largely from the addition of Revolt TV—the new, music-focused,
multi-platform channel of which he's the majority owner—to his
already-hefty portfolio.

Diddy has plenty of competition in the race to $1 billion. His top
challengers are Dr. Dre, who ranks second with $550 million, and Jay
Z, in third place with an estimated $520 million. The former
leapfrogged the latter on this year's Forbes Five thanks to a large
stake in Beats By Dr. Dre, which he cofounded with Interscope chief
Jimmy Iovine in 2008.

The company controls an astounding two-thirds of the premium headphone
market, with annual sales reportedly in excess of $1 billion and
growing. Private equity firm Carlyle invested $500 million for a
minority stake last year, pushing Beats' value past $1 billion and
likely closer to $2 billion.
"Beats has a unique brand—it speaks to a nice young demographic, which
is really interesting to marketers," says Peter Csathy, former
president of Musicmatch, an early digital music purveyor acquired by
YahooYHOO+0.11%in 2004 for $160 million. "When I think about Beats, I
think about it as a lifestyle, I think of it as a media company, not
just a hardware and music-focused company."
Jay Z's fortune continues to grow at a healthy clip, too. He's made
multiple nine-figure deals in the past, including his $204 million
Rocawear sale in 2007 and his $150 million pact with Live Nation in
2008. But much of his recent growth comes from Roc Nation, his record
label and management firm that recently added a sports agency. The
outfit gets a single-digit cut of pacts like Robinson Cano's $240
million monster agreement.

Bryan "Birdman" Williams, whose net worth would be over $300 million
if he didn't share his fortune with brother Ronald "Slim" Williams.
The duo cofounded Cash Money Records two decades ago; Cash Money
continues to grow with a roster that includes Drake, Nicki Minaj and
Lil Wayne. Birdman has also diversified with Cash Money Content, GT
Vodka and the YMCMB clothing line.
Rounding out the list is 50 Cent, who owes most of his fortune to his
$100 million haul from the sale of Vitaminwater in 2007. Now he's
trying to repeat the feat with companies like SMS Audio and SK Energy
beverages. In the meantime, he'll reboot his music career by taking
his G-Unit Records independent and releasing new albumAnimal
Ambitionin June.Culled from Forbes.

Note: This story is an expanded version of a piece that ran in the May
5, 2014 issue of FORBES magazine.