Caroline Byrne and James Lumley, from Bloomberg, discuss the judgment in the McCartney divorce case.

March 17 (Bloomberg) -- Former Beatle Paul McCartney's wife Heather Mills will receive 24.3 million pounds ($49 million) under a judgment ending the couple's marriage of almost four years.

McCartney, 65, must pay Mills 16.5 million pounds and she will retain 7.8 million pounds of her own assets, a court in London said today. Mills, 40, had been seeking almost 125 million pounds, the court said in a summary of the judgment today.

McCartney, who co-wrote songs such as ``Let It Be'' and ``Can't Buy Me Love,'' and Mills announced they were getting divorced in 2006. The award ``is in line'' with what lawyers expected, said Alan Kaufman, head of family law at London-based Finers Stephens Innocent in London.

``He is going to be much happier than she will be because it is a lot nearer what he proposed, 15.8 million pounds, than the number she wanted, 125 million pounds,'' said Kaufman, who isn't involved in the case.

Mills said she was ``very pleased'' with the award. The judgment ``was always going to be between 15 and 30 million'' pounds, she said.

Judge Hugh Bennett found that McCartney's total wealth, including business assets, was about 400 million pounds, not the 800 million-pound figure cited in some media reports, according to the summary of the judgment.

4-Year-Old Daughter

McCartney declined to comment after the hearing today. While Mills told reporters that she would not appeal the judgment, she is appealing the court's decision to make the full text of the ruling public.

Bennett decided ``the needs of the wife were a factor of magnetic importance,'' the court said in a statement. Bennett also ordered McCartney to pay 35,000 pounds a year to provide for their 4-year-old daughter, Beatrice, and pay for her school fees and a nanny. The divorce will be final when a ``decree absolute'' is issued.

``The court has been keen to ensure there is no great disparity between the lifestyle Beatrice will enjoy with her mother and the one she will enjoy with her father,'' said Emma Hatley, a divorce lawyer at London-based Withers LLP.

McCartney married Mills in 2002 four years after Linda McCartney, his wife of almost 30 years, died of breast cancer.

McCartney was born in Liverpool, England, in 1942. He met John Lennon at church picnic in 1957 when Lennon was playing in a band called ``The Quarrymen,'' according to Rolling Stone Magazine's Web-site. By 1960, the band had renamed itself ``The Beatles'' and was playing clubs in Hamburg. They broke up in 1970.

To contact the reporter on this story: Caroline Byrne in London at cbyrne12@bloomberg.net. James Lumley in London at jlumley1@bloomberg.net.