Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
£1.2MILLION A DAY WAGE
Bet365 boss pays herself record £323m jackpot
THE billionaire founder of online gambling giant Bet365 paid herself £323million last year – a record for the boss of a UK business.
Denise Coates got a near £277million salary, plus half of the £92million in dividends dished out to shareholders, according to newly published accounts.
It comes on top of the £265million Ms Coates took home last year. In the past five years she has made £988million.
Her latest payout equates to £1.2million for every working day last year and is 9,500 times the average UK salary.
Luke Hildyard, of think-tank the High Pay Centre, said: “This looks like cynical timing, sneaked out straight after a general election campaign where excess wealth, taxes on the rich and the vast gap between those at the top and everybody else have been key issues.
“It’s important wealth and how it’s created and shared are debated.
“But the publication of these figures seems designed to avoid scrutiny, suggesting even Bet365 recognise that, while success should be rewarded, such a colossal payout goes far beyond what is fair and proportionate.”
Ms Coates, 52, comes from a bookmaking background, with her dad running a chain of shops.
She persuaded her family to remortgage them to gamble on internet betting and founded Bet365 in a portable cabin in a car park in
Stoke in 2000. When the dotcom bubble burst, the business almost went bust, but has since become an industry giant.
The latest accounts for Bet365 show it took £65billion worth of bets in the year to March 31 this year, with profits rising from £791.4million to £800million.
Ms Coates, who is reportedly worth £6.8billion, rarely gives interviews.
She once said: “I don’t really enjoy the attention. I’m not saying I’m a shrinking violet, I’m not. I’ve been bossy all my life.” She has also given a lot to charity. The accounts showed £85million was donated to the Denise Coates Foundation, up by £10million on 2017.
It had £189million of investments in March 2018 and made almost £10million in grants and donations to good causes that year.
It emerged last year work had begun on Ms Coates’ dream home, a £90million “modern country estate” in 52 acres in Cheshire.
The accounts also disclose the finances of Stoke City FC, where Bet365 is the majority shareholder.
Despite turnover dropping from £138million to £82million after relegation from the Premier League, losses fell from £21.8million to £8.7million. Bet365, which paid almost £43million in corporation tax, did not respond to a request for a comment.
In the accounts, Ms Coates wrote: “The group continued to experience significant growth.”