Prince Harry is in for a major payday when he turns 40

In less than two weeks, Prince Harry is set to receive £8 million as he turns 40 – thanks to a trust fund set up by his great grandmother.

In 1994, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother set aside £19 million to be given to each of her grandchildren.

They would receive the first half on their 21st birthday and the second on their 40th, it’s understood.

A former Palace aide told the Times: ‘There was a trust fund set up at the time. It was a way in which the Queen Mother could set aside money for when her great-grandchildren were older and a way of passing a slice of her estate down in a tax-efficient way.

‘It was a way in which some of her estate could be ring-fenced for them.’ 

With this newfound cash, Meghan and Harry’s net worth will likely top £45 million pounds.

The payment comes after it was revealed in April that Prince Harry made an astounding £22 million from his book ‘Spare’.

The Duke of Sussex’s memoir Spare has become the fastest-selling non-fiction book in the UK since records began in 1998.

Prince Harry sold 467,183 copies of his controversial autobiography in the first week, according to Nielsen BookData.

A previous record of 210,506 had been set by the first Pinch Of Nom cookbook – written by Kay Allinson – in 2019.

But these are not the final figures as the Nielsen BookData does not include e-books or audiobooks and refers only to the sale of physical copies.

Spare, ghostwritten by JR Moehringer, is the only non-fiction book to make it into the top 10 fastest-selling books in the UK since records began.

Since January 1998, JK Rowling has dominated the chart, with four of her Harry Potter novels sitting at the top.

Meanwhile, Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol claims the fifth spot ahead of Spare at number six.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.