Magnus does not defend world championship

i wouldn't know great chess if it hit me in the face.  but then again, i have no face.

Money is certainly a factor in the decision.   He only got the equivalent of 1.4 million usd I think. Once taxes are deducted, then all his team are paid, then all travel, food, hotel bills are paid, & other costs, there isn't much financial motivation to justify all the training, work/effort that goes into it. Of course he's looked at all the prize funds of past championships & doesn't feel like it adds up. I bet if the prize fund were at least doubled it might motivate him again.  I think this is a good chess move on his part to make that happen. 

Magnus owns Play Magnus Group, who in turn own chess24 and Chessable: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/22/sports/magnus-carlsen-chess.html

Besides that he is sponsored by Puma and Unibet, and he has no intention to stop playing. If anything he'll be more visible, as he doesn't have to go into hiding for half a year to prepare for the match.

Ding and Nepo are 2 and 3 on the live rating list, so in addition to having qualified, it's also fair to see them there.

Carlsen is so wealthy, at this point, that a million dollars is virtually meaningless to him.

His net worth is somewhere between $30 million and $50 million. Imagine how much passive income he earns each day ...

Not to quibble, but what is your source for the 30-50 million? That is a very wide range. Most sources I find place a figure of about 8 million. Just curious.🤔

Various sources and some estimation.

He's been earning $2-3 million a year (ballpark) from chess earnings and sponsorships, ever since becoming World Champion at 2013. That puts his earnings at around $20-25 million.

But that's also not considering his holdings in PlayMagnus (which owns multiple companies, such as: Chessable, Chess24, Everyman Chess, etc ...), which (last I checked) was worth $85 million.

He owns approximately 10% of that company. So that's another $8.5 million, right there (liquid assets).

That puts him at around $28-32 million.

He also recently signed a $5 million sponsorship deal with Unibet. So now we're at $32-37 million.

And, on top of that, I assume his money isn't just staying stagnant all these years. He's certainly earning interest and likely investing, too. So bump that figure up another few million and we have a reasonable (IMO) estimate of his worth:

Let's say around $40 million?

Again, a lot of this is estimation. But I think it's reasonable.

I also think it's not really relevant whether it's 40 or 10 million. The point is, each title defence costs him almost half a year of work, including all the associated costs of maintaining his team. From a financial point of view, it's not worth it for him.

A very fair point.

Seems that a few simple searches places a figure anywhere between 8 and 50 million in net worth. We can thank the internet for such wild ranges I suppose. There is no doubt that he can live comfortably. I also wonder how much of his earnings are taxed at the Norwegian rate. One for certain, I’ll take either 8 or 50 mil any day!

Yeah, so Im not buying this retirement.

Could he hold an event, but not call it world championship or different league....

He has an idea that no one can explain, but lets say you take 4 players and get a winner of that.

And if he wins, say hes back to world championship and thanks for keeping the seat warm.

Maybe he doesn't mind being taxed if it contributes to his country not being dysfunctional and doesn't affect his standard of living.

Being from the US, I can definitely see how that would be desirable! 

https://ratings.fide.com/top.phtml?list=men

July 2022 ratings

Ding- 2806

And in Jan. Alireza was a 2800+ player.

“if he wants to be seen as the best player of 2022 he needs to prove it imo”

Well, he has been clear winner of the tournaments he has played in 2022, and undefeated. It’s not as if his results in 2022 would have been better if he had signed a match contract :-)