Walmart Founder Sam Walton's Genius Move: Why He Never Gave His 5 Kids Company Stock

Sam Walton's estate planning is drawing attention after a Miami attorney described how the Walmart Inc. (NASDAQ:WMT) founder walled off his heirs' stake from divorce courts, avoiding the kind of splintering that wrecks family fortune.

Miami Attorney Details Walton Dynasty Protection Strategy

Jose M. Ferrer, a highly rated attorney in Miami, Florida, specializing in business litigation, international litigation and arbitration and complex commercial cases, said Walton's key move was keeping Walmart stock out of his children's personal names.

"Sam didn’t give the shares of Walmart to any of his kids. He put them in a trust and gave his children rights in that trust," Ferrer said. "And the terms of that trust are simple. No matter what happens, how many people you marry, and how many times you get divorced, the shares don’t leave the trust. And that trust, it’s only managed by the Walton family."

"So, if you are founder and you have a family and you have kids, you have to understand that not every marriage is going to survive, that some marriages are going to break up, and that you can’t allow your children’s marriages to dissolve the company that you built," he added.

See Also: All I Want for Christmas Is Four Easy Payments: ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’ Spend Is Projected To Hit $20 Billion During The 2025 Holiday Season

Trust Structure Keeps Walmart Stock Largely Divorce-Proof

Walton also used the family partnership Walton Enterprises and later the Walton Family Holdings Trust, keeping Walmart stock in family-controlled entities instead of as marital property, so even multiple divorces among heirs never pried core shares away. This structure meant the stock belonged to the family entities, not to individual spouses, insulating ownership when marriages fell apart.

Ferrer contrasted that with the Vanderbilts, an American family who gained prominence during the Gilded Age, whose wealth thinned over generations as ownership left the family in divorces and inheritances.

Rising Walmart Shares Supercharge Walton Family Fortunes

Today, all three surviving children, Rob, Jim and Alice Walton, are firmly in the $100 billion club, while the broader heir group, including grandson Lukas, controls nearly $440 billion in wealth, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index data.

Their fortunes have grown as Walmart shares have risen about 24% so far in 2025, helped by e-commerce turning profitable, expanded automation and the retailer's navigation of Trump-era tariffs that forced tough pricing calls.

A high-profile partnership with OpenAI, which will let shoppers buy Walmart products directly through ChatGPT, has pushed the stock to record highs, gains that still flow back into the same partnerships and trusts Walton built to keep his empire intact.

Benzinga’s Edge Stock Rankings showed that WMT stock has a strong price trend in the short, medium and long terms, with a solid Momentum ranking. Check here for more detailed performance metrics.

Photo Courtesy: Joni Hanebutt on Shutterstock.com

Read Next:

• He Took Out 500% APR Payday Loans. Dave Ramsey Says, ‘Teach Your Children, Teach Your Grandchildren, Teach Everyone’s Children To Stay Away’