Simon Cowell has taken a brutal swipe at some of the world’s richest billionaires, branding them snobby and obnoxious.
The music mogul, 65, has amassed his own vast fortune thanks to his string of TV shows, but in a new interview has insisted he has nowhere near the £500 million he is estimated to be worth.
Speaking on the How To Fail podcast, Simon shared that he doesn’t feel money is the biggest drive for him, and he’s happy with the amount he has, with his fiancée Lauren Silverman and their son Eric at his side.
He said: ‘I’ve definitely got enough. I don’t need any more.
‘I don’t yearn for what I thought I wanted a few years ago because when I was a kid I had no idea of anything like yachts and the Caribbean or private planes.
‘So when the first time — I guess in my early forties, it must have been — I came across this world and saw it and I’m like, ‘What? That is your own boat?’ It was like a cruise ship.
Simon Cowell has taken a brutal swipe at some of the world’s richest billionaires, branding them snobby and obnoxious
The music mogul has amassed his own vast fortune thanks to his string of TV shows, but insisted he has nowhere near the £500 million he is estimated to be worth (pictured in 2019)
‘So there was a point where maybe I felt I haven’t done as well [as I thought], maybe that’s what I want.
‘And I did start to mix with some of those people for a couple of years. And I’m going to be honest with you, I hated it. I didn’t like the people.’
‘I thought they were obnoxious, I thought they were snobby.
‘I think a lot of those people thought they were better than other people because they had money, which is ridiculous when you think about it.’
While Simon did not specifically name any of the billionaires he was referring to, he has previously pictured with Top Shop owner Sir Phillip Green.
He went onto reveal that he has previously had a conversation with his partner Lauren about his own wealth.
The Britain’s Got Talent star said: ‘I remember saying to Lauren, ”Do we actually know anyone who’s rich – I mean super-rich – and happy?”.
‘She went, ”no”, and I went, ”nor me”.
While Simon did not specifically name any of the billionaires he was referring to, he has previously pictured with Top Shop owner Sir Phillip Green (pictured in 2009)
The former X Factor star has also previously crossed paths with Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone (pictured in 2012)
Simon also shared that he doesn’t feel money is the biggest drive for him, and he’s happy with the amount he has, with his fiancée Lauren Silverman and their son Eric at his side
‘So we’re fine, we’re doing alright. We don’t need any more,’ before shutting down claims that his fortune is worth £500 million.
He added: ‘I’m not even close to that. I’ve made a bit of money, yes, but not that much, no.’
Simon also said he worries because the world is ‘so precarious’ he never feels relaxed about how much money he has.
The father of one recalled how during the early days of the Covid pandemic he pushed out all of his projects early over fears that they would be halted.
He said: ‘I always worry about money because I think you have to in a way. You think about Covid as an example.
‘I remember reading it for the first time on a website, and I don’t read a lot of stuff on social media, but I’d heard about it, so I was curious.
‘Second day, the story got bigger to a point where I actually phoned my partner and I said “I don’t like the look of this, I have a horrible feeling it’s going to be like that movie Contagion, and I think we need to get all of our shows into production around the world quicker this year”. And we did.
‘And when it happened it was obviously worse than I could have imagined,
‘When you think about that, the wars, and everything else, the instability, what is safe? Is it gold, cash, stocks. I don’t think anything’s safe any longer. I guess your house.
‘Someone did actually say to me once “live in your money”. And it was really good advice, i.e, enjoy it, and be happy with it, but understand that the world is precarious.’
Simon downsized his company SyCo to ‘focus on family’ and says he no longer feels the need to make as much money, claiming that nobody he knows who is ‘super rich’ is happy.
While his ITV talent show is still a raging success attracting around five million viewers each episode, Simon has wound down some of his other projects.
The X Factor ran for 14 years, from 2004 to 2018, but Simon decided to call it quits on the long-running show due to declining viewing figures and a belief that online platforms like YouTube were taking over the need for talent shows.
The musical mogul had excitedly announced a bid to find the next big boyband – claiming there hadn’t been one as big as 1D since – and launched a Netflix series, The Midas Touch.
But Simon’s latest project was scrapped, seemingly due to lack of interest when he failed to get enough talent auditioning to become ‘the next One Direction’.
Simon’s slow wind down has come in recent years as he bids to focus more on his partner Lauren Silverman, with whom he shares son Eric, 11.
The TV personality also stepped away from the limelight in August 2020 when he broke his back during an E-bike accident while testing it at his Malibu home.
He underwent six hours of surgery and claimed at a later date that it was ‘much worse than people first thought’.
He suffered a second horrific accident on the electronic bikes when he broke his arm in London while riding one in 2022.
