Ashton Kutcher Just Donated $4 Million to the Ellen Degeneres Wildlife Fund

Ashton Kutcher, the famous Hollywood actor, surprised Ellen Degeneres when he made a stop at the set of her show last Wednesday to deliver some surprising news. Kutcher quizzed Ellen what she had been up to, she promptly replied that she was getting ready to go on vacation. The destination? Africa.

Indeed, at the time, Ellen was prepping up a tour of Africa for the building of a campus dedicated towards the conservation of mountain gorillas

The Ellen Degeneres Campus of the Diana Fossey Gorilla Fund, a gift from Portia De Rossi to Ellen on her 60th birthday, is joined at the hip to the Ellen DeGeneres Wildlife Fund.

Once she shared that bit of information, Kutcher replied in turn that he had something to share with regards to the fund. He brought out Hollywood manager, Guy Oseary, and the duo explained their recent investment ventures in tech companies.

In particular,  as Sound Ventures partners, they had worked closely with Ripple, a platform that facilitates the seamless transfer of funds. After having a conversation with the company’s founders, Kutcher went on to explain how the ethics of the company and the platform was dedicated to giving out some of their profits to companies and people around the world who were concerned with doing good in the world.

Kindred Spirit

One of the people they considered was DeGeneres. Having learned about her recently gifted birthday gift, Kutcher was aware that she needed some help in order to make sure the fund was in good standing. Notably, he mentioned that DeGeneres was known to never ask anyone for help, instead, she was renown for her will to battle it out. A point with Oseary acknowledged as being truthful.

Because of her committed nature, Kutcher exclaimed that together with Oseary, they realized it was high time that others showed that they were willing to think about the wellbeing of Degeneres. On behalf of Ripple, they offered to give her a cool $4 million

Immediately Kutcher mentioned the figures, Degeneres eyes lit-up, she was awestruck. Interestingly, as Kutcher shared while holding his phone up to her, instead of posing up with a huge dummy check as is usually the norm in such circumstances, they could have the funds transferred into Rwandan franks right then and there. All it took, was the push of a button.

True to her nature, Degeneres made sure to make a joke about the generous offer. She exclaimed that she was ready to push the phone’s button really good. Later on, she shared that the donation was the most amazing thing she had ever received, before proceeding to thank both Kutcher and Oseary for their wonderful gesture.

The Trip

During her vacation, Degeneres made a point to make a quick pit stop at Nairobi’s Giraffe Manor over the Memorial Day weekend. She captured the moment on Instagram

The Giraffe Manor is a boutique hotel owned by The Safari Collection. Remarkably, the hotel has been around for quite some time having been established in the 1930s in 140 acres of indigenous forest. The establishment boasts a plethora of Rothschild’s giraffes that have grown accustomed to human interaction and are quite friendly.

The Ellen Degeneres Wildlife fund was founded in order to support global conservation efforts, especially for the critically endangered species in the wild. The fund is currently focused on the construction of a permanent home for the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund. They aim to secure the future of wild gorillas in Rwanda by building upon successful field conservation efforts. At the same time, they seek to empower the people living around the gorillas’ establishment to thrive by taking care of their ecosystem.