It is always fun watching the ever-compassionate and kind-hearted Ellen DeGeneres surprise guests on her hit talk show The Ellen DeGeneres Show, but on today’s episode, the longtime animal advocate found herself on the receiving end of an emotional and monumental surprise presented by none other than her friend and neighbor Ashton Kutcher.
Kutcher and Guy Oseary, are partners in the tech investment fund, Sound Ventures, who presented a stunned and glossy-eyed DeGeneres with a four-million-dollar donation to The Ellen DeGeneres Wildlife Fund.
Kutcher and Oseary, who are investing in Ripple, an international cryptocurrency transfer app, explained that while meeting with the founders of Ripple, Chris Larsen and Brad Garlinghouse, they learned about the ethics of the tech company and how they want to give back to others who are helping to make the world a better place. This generous group of forward-thinking men decided to team up to give Ellen a four-million-dollar donation to help save the last 880 Mountian gorillas remaining in the wild.
“You never ask for help and are always thinking about everyone else,” Kutcher said to DeGeneres. “We wanted to show you that people are thinking about you.”
The well-deserved donation was immediately transferred into the fund that her wife, Portia de Rossi, recently established in honor of DeGeneres’ 60th birthday.
Foregoing a ‘big giant check’ which has become the norm,” Kutcher told DeGeneres that by using Ripple, they had the ability to “transfer it into Rwandan Francs right now, right here, and all you need to do is push this button.”
Kutcher timed the surprise to coincide with DeGeneres leaving for “vacation” to save gorillas in Rwanda.
