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Prince Andrew’s judgment and finances have been the subject of a long-standing controversy. This issue came to the fore last year when he stepped down from his duties as a working royal due to his association with the financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Recently, he has been embroiled in another controversy with his links to a Chinese business contact accused of cultivating financial links with him, which could be exploited for “leverage for political purposes.” Buckingham Palace did not comment on the matter, as they do not act for the Prince, who is no longer a working royal.
The Royals have always been a target for individuals who seek to build links for their personal ambition or strategic political agenda. This raises questions about Prince Andrew’s financial dealings, which have been the subject of scrutiny. In recent months, there has been increased public interest in how he plans to pay for his 30-room mansion in Windsor, Royal Lodge. As the King is no longer funding him, and the security bill alone is believed to be several million pounds per year, the media has called the scrutiny the “Siege of Royal Lodge.”
The Prince does not receive public funding from the Sovereign Grant, but he has wealthy international contacts from his globetrotting days as a government trade envoy between 2001 and 2011. In 2009, he carried out 550 engagements involved with this unpaid trade role, and it brought him on trips to 15 countries in 2010-11. Although it is unknown how much he might have inherited from his mother or other family members, glimpses of his financial arrangements can be seen, sometimes in the reflected light of other stories.
One such occasion was in 2022 when he was named repeatedly in a court dispute between a Turkish millionaire and her former business adviser. The case highlighted the Prince as receiving payments in a complex set of financial deals. There were no suggestions of wrongdoing by the Prince, but £750,000 was returned to the Turkish millionaire by the Prince. Concerns have been raised about his links to the son-in-law of a deposed Tunisian president, and MPs have also raised questions about the sale of his former home Sunninghill Park in 2007. Reports also suggest the Prince received help with paying off loans.
Despite Prince Andrew’s many claims of specific figures, it has never been disclosed how much he paid in the settlement with Virginia Giuffre or how he might have financed that case. He denied any wrongdoing in the case. The withdrawal of the King’s funding paints a picture of an isolated figure, operating outside the royal fold. Being in such a position leaves the Prince vulnerable to those seeking to exploit his financial links and jeopardize his judgment
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