Britain's richest woman plots £9bn sale of gambling empire

Telegraph

01-05-2025

Britain's richest self-made woman is plotting a £9bn sale of her gambling empire amid booming demand in the United States.
Denise Coates, the billionaire owner of Bet365, has reportedly held discussions with Wall Street banks and advisers over a potential deal. Options under discussion include listing all or part of the business on a US stock exchange.
The Coates family could also sell a stake to a private equity investor while retaining a holding ahead of any listing, the Guardian reported.
A full sale could land Ms Coates, who holds a 58pc stake in Bet365, a payday of more than £5bn.
A transaction would cap off a remarkable journey for Ms Coates and Bet365, which she launched online from a portable cabin in Stoke-on-Trent in 2000. She took control of the Bet365 gambling empire from her father, Peter, who set up the business as a high street betting chain.
The company was a pioneer of online gambling and has since grown into one of the world's largest betting businesses. It posted pre-tax profits of £627m last year on revenues of £3.7bn.
The success has generated a vast fortune for Ms Coates, who is Britain's best-paid woman. The 57-year-old took a significant pay cut last year, but still took home about £158m in salary and bonuses.
Bet365 last year transferred ownership to Ms Coates's brother, John, while her father remains on the board. Ms Coates and her family have an estimated personal wealth of £7.5bn.
Ms Coates, a media-shy tycoon who lives in a £90m mansion in Cheshire, is a prominent patron of the arts and has a wing of the Courtauld Gallery in London named after her. The Coates family also owns Stoke City Football Club.
Over the past two decades, Peter Coates and companies within the Bet365 group have also given hundreds of thousands of pounds to Labour.
A sale of Bet365 would allow the Coates family to cash in on the fortune they have built over the past quarter of a century.
It could also provide an opportunity for an American buyer to capitalise on the rapid growth of gambling in the US after a 2018 Supreme Court decision that relaxed decades-old laws banning sports betting.
Rival Flutter, which owns Betfair and Paddy Power, last year shifted its primary listing from London to New York, saying the move would give it better access to US investors and a deeper pool of capital.
Bet365 has been expanding in the US and has so far secured the right to operate in 13 states.
It has also pulled out of China, a market that triggered controversy given gambling is outlawed everywhere in the country apart from in Macau and Hong Kong. The exit was seen by observers as laying the groundwork for a possible stock market listing.