Billionaire Bet365 boss takes a 45% pay cut despite soaring profits
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Denise Coates paid herself £150m in salary and dividends last year – far below the £466m she collected in 2020. Britain’s highest-paid woman, the Bet365 billionaire Denise Coates, has given herself a 45% pay cut, receiving £150m in salary and dividends last year despite soaring profits at the online gambling company.
The Stoke-based business reported an increase in turnover from £3.4bn to £3.7bn last year, while also cutting costs and benefiting from a one-off gain on the value of its investments. These three factors catapulted the company to a £626m profit before tax in the year to the end of March 2024, compared with a £60m pre-tax loss the year before.
Coates is known in part for her record-breaking pay packets, which have exceeded £2bn during her time at the helm of Bet365, an online gambling empire that she transformed from a chain of betting shops owned by her father, Peter. The 57-year-old, who has described herself as the “ultimate gambler”, paid herself £95m this year and is also entitled to at least half of the £110m dividend that the company paid, based on her shareholding of more than 50%.
The total £150m payout is significantly down on the previous year, when she awarded herself £270m, and far below the record-breaking £466m she collected in 2020. In 2021, Coates collected £300m. The group also donated £120m to the Denise Coates Foundation, a charity she set up that is controlled by members of the Coates family and their employees. The sum is a fifth up on the £100m given to the foundation last year.
