Adnan Khashoggi Net Worth

What Was Adnan Khashoggi's Net Worth?

Adnan Khashoggi was a Saudi Arabian businessman who had a net worth of $100 million at the time of his death in 2017. However, it should be noted that Adnan's finances in the last few decades of his life were extremely murky and hard to peg. At the peak of his career in the 1980s, Adnan Khashoggi's net worth topped $4 billion, which briefly made him one of the richest people in the world. According to a lawsuit in 1990, his net worth by that time was $8 million, and he only had 47 cents in his main bank account. Much more detail on Adnan's finances throughout this article.

Known for his extravagant lifestyle, high-profile connections, and role as a global arms broker, Khashoggi was often described as the "Great Gatsby of the Middle East." He headed Triad International Holding Company, a sprawling investment empire that controlled properties, businesses, and financial interests across multiple continents.

Khashoggi played key roles in two major geopolitical scandals: the Lockheed bribery scandal and the Iran-Contra affair. Though he was implicated in both, he was ultimately acquitted in the United States. He was also central to a series of financial collapses that triggered one of the largest Securities Investor Protection Corporation payouts in history.

As an arms dealer, Khashoggi brokered extremely lucrative defense contracts between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. His client list included Lockheed, Northrop, Raytheon, and Grumman, and between 1970 and 1975, he collected $106 million in commissions from Lockheed alone – the equivalent of nearly $500 million today. At the height of his wealth, Khashoggi reportedly spent $250,000 to $300,000 per day funding his lifestyle.

His nephew was Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.

Divorce Settlement

When Adnan divorced his wife, Soraya Khashoggi, the case dragged on bitterly for five years. When it was all said and done, a judge ordered Adnan to pay a reported $875 million to Soraya. It was the largest divorce settlement in history at the time and still one of the most expensive divorces ever.

Soraya Khashoggi/Getty Images

Early Life and Career Beginnings

Adnan Khashoggi was born on July 25, 1935, in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. His father, Mohammad Khashoggi, served as the personal physician to King Abdul Aziz Al Saud, founder of the Saudi state. That position placed the Khashoggi family inside the innermost ring of the royal court, giving young Adnan a level of access to princes, diplomats, and foreign dignitaries unmatched by almost anyone of his generation. From the beginning, he was raised in the orbit of immense power.

He attended Victoria College in Alexandria, a school so elite it was often described as the "Eton of Egypt." There, he studied alongside the sons of kings and political leaders across the Middle East. His classmates included the future King Hussein of Jordan, with whom he forged an early friendship that helped shape his confidence navigating royal circles.

Khashoggi later completed brief educational stints at California State University, Chico, Ohio State University, and Stanford University, where he absorbed American business practices and strengthened his cosmopolitan persona. Ultimately, formal schooling was less important to him than the relationships he cultivated and the business instincts he rapidly developed.

His first major business success came almost by accident. A Saudi construction firm struggled to operate trucks in the desert due to narrow tires getting stuck in the sand. Using money provided by his father, Khashoggi purchased a fleet of Kenworth heavy trucks equipped with wide tires and leased them back to the company. The deal earned him $250,000, a fortune for a young man, and made him Kenworth's official agent in Saudi Arabia. It also taught him the lesson that would define his career: the real money is in being the middleman who connects people who need things with people who can provide them.

By the early 1960s, Khashoggi was perfectly positioned to connect the world's largest defense contractors with the Saudi royal family — a role that would soon transform him into one of the richest, most influential power brokers alive.

Business Career in the 1960s and 1970s

During the 1960s and 70s, Khashoggi became one of the most important intermediaries between Western defense companies and the Saudi state. The Six-Day War in 1967 had exposed vulnerabilities in the Arab world's military capabilities, and the Saudi government began a historic defense spending spree. Khashoggi stepped into this moment as the indispensable connector.

His first major client was Lockheed, for whom he provided strategy, access, and introductions at the highest levels of Saudi leadership. Between 1970 and 1975 alone, Lockheed paid him $106 million in commissions — nearly $500 million in today's dollars. But that was only the beginning. U.S. Senate inquiries later revealed:

• $54 million in commissions from Northrop
• $23 million from Raytheon
• $45 million from the French for a tank deal
• $7 million from the British for helicopter sales
• An additional $100 million later paid by Lockheed
• A further $31 million from Northrop

His commission rate — often between 2% and 15% — meant that even moderately sized weapons deals generated tens of millions of dollars for him personally.

To manage his growing influence, Khashoggi built a labyrinth of companies in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, designed to handle payments discreetly and move money globally. He developed sustained relationships with senior U.S. intelligence officials, including CIA operatives Kim Roosevelt and James Critchfield, further cementing his role in the shadowy intersection of business, diplomacy, and covert operations.

Khashoggi's methods were infamous. He confessed to sending lavish gifts — cash, cars, jewelry, and women — to powerful figures. His entourage of models and actresses, whom he called his "pleasure wives," were flown around the world to accompany him at parties and to impress or influence business partners.

By the late 1970s, Khashoggi wasn't just a businessman; he was a global archetype of high-flying wealth and influence. His lifestyle became legend: 12 homes, 1,000 tailored suits, a $40 million customized Douglas DC-8 described as a flying nightclub, and a daily burn rate of up to $300,000.

But behind the scenes, cracks were forming. His immense visibility made him a growing embarrassment to some members of the Saudi royal family, and as his profile rose in the West, his influence quietly eroded at home.

Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

Triad International

One of Khashoggi's most ambitious undertakings was the creation of Triad International Holding Company, launched in the early 1960s. Initially formed to manage a handful of investment projects, Triad eventually grew into a sprawling multinational conglomerate with holdings across five continents.

Triad's holdings included:

• Shopping centers, hotels, and luxury resorts
• Oil refineries and petroleum companies
• Banks and construction firms
• A gold mine in Africa
• Automobile franchises
• The Utah Jazz NBA team
• The Mount Kenya Safari Club
• Town Center East in San Francisco
• Long Beach Edgington Oil
• Vast ranch and land holdings in the American West

Khashoggi himself maintained residences in New York, London, Beirut, Geneva, Paris, Cairo, Rome, and Salt Lake City, among others. His private fleet included superyachts, helicopters, and multiple Boeing 727 jets.

Unfortunately, much of Triad's empire was poorly managed, dependent on constant cash flow, and extremely sensitive to oil market fluctuations. A series of colossal missteps — including a $500 million hotel project in Giza, a $1 billion real estate venture in Salt Lake City, and failed oil investments in Sudan — accelerated his financial decline.

Iran-Contra and Imelda Marcos Affairs

In the mid-1980s, Khashoggi became embroiled in the Iran-Contra affair, a covert U.S. operation involving the sale of missiles to Iran in exchange for help freeing American hostages in Lebanon. Khashoggi acted as a middleman, arranging meetings between Iranian and Israeli arms dealers and providing $25 million in bridging finance to keep the operation afloat. When the deal soured and payments stalled, it was Khashoggi's pressure for reimbursement that helped blow the cover off the entire operation.

At the same time, he became entangled in controversies surrounding Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos of the Philippines. After being accused of helping hide more than $300 million in Manhattan real estate, fine art, and other assets tied to the Marcos regime, Khashoggi was arrested in Switzerland in 1989 and later extradited to New York. He spent three months in Swiss custody before a U.S. court case ended in his acquittal in 1990.

But the trial revealed the depth of his financial collapse: Khashoggi's net worth had fallen to about $8 million, he owed $88 million, and one of his bank accounts contained just 47 cents.

In the decades that followed, Khashoggi drifted into increasingly desperate ventures, including bank fraud allegations in Thailand and participation in stock-ramping schemes that resulted in a 2010 U.S. ban preventing him from serving as an officer or director of any American company.

Media Appearances

At the height of his fame, Khashoggi embraced media attention and was a fixture of 1980s celebrity culture. He appeared on "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" in 1985 and on the British television series "After Dark" in 1991, where he spoke alongside former U.K. Prime Minister Edward Heath and Lord Weidenfeld. Magazine profiles chronicled his wealth, charm, excess, and influence, cementing his image as the world's most flamboyant wheeler-dealer.

Personal Life

Khashoggi married three times. His first wife, English-born Sandra Daly (who adopted the name Soraya after converting to Islam), was the mother of his daughter Nabila and sons Mohamed, Khalid, Hussein, and Omar. Since 2004, Nabila has been married to billionaire Cox Enterprises heir James Cox Chambers. Adnan's second wife, Italian-born Laura Biancolini (later Lamia), gave him a son named Ali. His third marriage, to Shahpari Azam Zanganeh, lasted from 1991 until 2014.

He died of complications from Parkinson's disease on June 6, 2017, at St. Thomas' Hospital in London.

Donald Trump Yacht Connection

One of the most enduring symbols of Adnan Khashoggi's wealth was his superyacht Nabila — a $100 million, 282-foot floating palace built in 1980. At the time, it was one of the largest and most expensive private vessels in the world. Outfitted with gold-plated fixtures, marble bathrooms, a disco, a movie theater, a hair salon, and even an onboard hospital, the yacht was such an opulent spectacle that it appeared as the villain's lair in the 1983 James Bond film "Never Say Never Again."

By 1987, however, Khashoggi's finances were collapsing under debt and legal pressure. After defaulting on a major personal loan to the Sultan of Brunei, Nabila was seized as collateral and quietly put up for sale.

(Photo by Barry Iverson/Getty Images)

Enter Donald Trump.

In late 1987, Trump — then a rising New York real estate figure — purchased the yacht for just under $30 million, a staggering discount from its original cost. The deal ran through the Sultan of Brunei, but Khashoggi himself imposed one unusual condition: Trump had to rename the yacht. He did not want his daughter's name broadcast across global headlines. Trump agreed, shaved a million dollars off the price, and renamed it the Trump Princess.

For several years, the Trump Princess became one of Trump's signature status symbols. He posed for photo spreads on its decks, held parties, and docked it near his Atlantic City casinos. But in 1991, amid severe financial strain, Trump sold the yacht for roughly $19–20 million to Saudi billionaire Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, a cousin of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Prince Al-Waleed renamed the yacht Kingdom 5KR, and it remained in his fleet for decades, even becoming headline news again in October 2024 when it suffered major damage after crashing into a dock in Tunisia.

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