Some artists go their entire lives penniless only to suddenly make a fortune after their death, but one painter secured himself an insane net worth after accepting 0.25% worth of Facebook stock in lieu of paycheck when he decorated the social media company's first ever office.
It's not uncommon for startup companies to offer stock options instead of payments to early participants, giving them an attractive risk versus reward prospect if the business manages to become successful down the line.
Most success stories in this vein allow stock holders to make hundreds of thousands of dollars after a company makes it big, but when you've held onto shares in a behemoth like Facebook, you're in for a fortune and a half.
That was what happened to artist David Choe after he was convinced by then-Facebook president Sean Parker to accept 0.25% of Facebook stock as a payment instead of $60,000, and as you can imagine that has paid off in the long run.
What was David Choe's Facebook stock worth?
It's unclear quite how many shares Choe's 0.25% equated to at the time of transfer, but he managed to earn himself far more than the initial $60,000 paycheck when the social media giant went public back in 2012.
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Despite thinking that social media as a whole was a 'joke' and initially refusing the stock options, Facebook's initial offering of $38 per share skyrocketed Choe's 0.25% ownership to around $200,000,000 in value - around 333,233% more than he would have got paid in cash for completing the artwork.
Facebook's overall valuation of $104 billion back in 2012 means that you can estimate that Choe held around 6,842,105 shares, which would be worth $4,915,026,126.75 right now based on Meta's current share price of $718.35.
It's unclear whether Choe sold all of his Facebook stock back in 2012 or whether he managed to hold onto a fair chunk of it, although he did in subsequent years create an exclusive art exhibition and a scavenger hunt with a $100,000 prize.
What is David Choe's net worth in 2025?
According to Enetworth.com, David Choe's current net worth sits at around $300,000,000, which while far lower than what he would have if he'd managed to hold onto all of his stocks, is still a significant fortune.
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Had Choe retained his 0.25% share of the social media company and sold every single stock right now, he would immediately become roughly the 776th richest person in the world, although he's likely glad to have had millions of dollars to play with across the past decade and a half.
His net worth does indicate that Choe managed to hold onto at least some of his Facebook (and eventually Meta) shares, although if you took that $300 million to be exclusively in Meta stock, that would leave him with just 417,623 shares - a 94% decrease compared to his initial estimated holdings.