WhatsApp Founders Got Around $9-Billion Share In Facebook Stock At The Time Of Acquisition

WhatsApp founders Jan Koum and Brian Acton received 116 million shares of Facebook, which is currently worth almost $9 billion (approximately Rs 55,300 crore), when Facebook acquired their unprofitable messaging service earlier this month.

Koum, a Ukrainian immigrant, got 76.4 million Facebook shares, now worth $5.8 billion (approximately Rs 35,600 crore), making him Facebook's fourth largest stockholder after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and two mutual funds – Fidelity Management and Vanguard.
Acton, who used to work with Koum as engineers in Yahoo, owns 39.7 million shares of Facebook worth $3 billion (approximately Rs 18,400 crore).

About 45 other employees of WhatsApp also received some Facebook shares. However, the number of shares received by the other employees was not disclosed.

Besides the Facebook stock, Koum and Acton also were paid a large chunk of the $4.6 billion in cash that was included in the WhatsApp acquisition. The amount of cash that WhatsApp founders received hasn't been disclosed.

Forbes’ has ranked both Koum (38) and Acton (42) among the 200 richest people in the US.