Who Actually Owns the Gambling Industry? The Billionaires, Corporations and Funds Behind Your Bets
Every time you stick a fiver on the football or spin a slot, that money flows somewhere. And if you trace it far enough, it ends up in the pockets of a surprisingly small group of billionaires and investment funds who have carved up the global gambling market between them.
We dug into the ownership structures, shareholder filings, and company reports to work out who actually controls this industry. The answer involves a British woman who pays herself more than any FTSE CEO, a Czech billionaire who now runs the National Lottery, an American heir worth billions who quietly owns nearly a quarter of the world’s biggest live casino company, and a handful of Wall Street funds that have hedged their bets by owning stakes in pretty much everyone.
Key Takeaways
| What We Found | The Numbers |
|---|---|
| Total revenue of top 5 operators | Over $27 billion annually |
| Denise Coates (Bet365) compensation 2025 | £280-287 million |
| Kenneth Dart’s stake in Evolution | 23.41% (~$3.15 billion) |
| Vanguard’s combined gambling holdings | Stakes in Flutter, Entain, AND Evolution |
| Coates family Bet365 ownership | 100% – no outside shareholders |
The Billionaires Running the Show
Denise Coates – The Stoke-on-Trent Billionaire
Denise Coates does not give interviews. She does not appear on panel shows or podcasts. What she does is run Bet365 from Stoke-on-Trent and take home more money than virtually anyone else in British business.
Her net worth sits at roughly $7.9 billion as of late 2025, which makes her one of the wealthiest self-made women on the planet. For the financial year ending March 2025, she received £104 million in salary plus somewhere between £176-183 million in dividends. That is £280-287 million in a single year, and this was during a period when the company’s profits actually dropped.
Bet365 Ownership Structure
| Family Member | Stake |
|---|---|
| Denise Coates | 58% |
| John Coates | ~25% |
| Peter Coates (Chairman) | Remaining balance |
| External shareholders | None |
The Coates family owns the lot. There are no institutional investors, no pension funds, no American hedge funds with seats on the board. When Bet365 made £4.03 billion in revenue last year, that money stayed in the family. The company is not publicly traded and shows no signs of changing that arrangement.
Karel Komárek – The Man Behind Your Lottery Ticket
If you have bought a National Lottery ticket since February 2024, your money has gone to a company controlled by Karel Komárek, a Czech billionaire most Brits have never heard of.
Komárek controls Allwyn through his investment vehicle KKCG, which holds the majority stake via Sazka Group. A recent 4.27% sale to J&T Arch in 2025 valued the entire company at €11.2 billion, which works out to about £9.6 billion. Allwyn took over from Camelot after acquiring their UK operations in Q1 2023.
So the National Lottery, which most people probably assume is some sort of quasi-governmental operation, is actually run by a Czech billionaire’s holding company. Funny how that works.
Kenneth Dart – The Quiet American
Kenneth Dart is worth billions ($13.8B DEC 2025), lives in the Cayman Islands, and owns 23.41% of Evolution AB through a vehicle called Candle Lake Ltd. That stake amounts to 47,870,198 shares in the world’s largest live casino provider.
Evolution is the company behind most of the live dealer games you see online – the ones with actual humans dealing cards on camera. They also own NetEnt, Red Tiger Gaming, and Big Time Gaming through acquisitions over the past few years. When you play live blackjack or roulette at pretty much any major online casino, there is a decent chance Evolution is running it and Kenneth Dart is benefiting.
Evolution Major Shareholders
| Shareholder | Stake | Shares |
|---|---|---|
| Candle Lake Ltd (Kenneth Dart) | 23.41% | 47,870,198 |
| Österbahr Ventures AB | 10.96% | 22,400,140 |
| Capital Group | 8.58% | 17,539,250 |
| BlackRock | 4.02% | 8,279,660 |
| Vanguard Group | 3.10% | 6,333,250 |
The Dart family money comes from Dart Container Corporation, the company that makes those foam cups you get at American takeaways. From styrofoam to live casino – that is quite the pivot.
The Corporate Giants
Flutter Entertainment – The Biggest of the Lot
Flutter is the largest online gambling company in the world by revenue. They pulled in $14.04 billion in 2024, up 19% from the year before, and their market cap reached roughly $46 billion by year end.
The company moved its primary listing to the New York Stock Exchange in May 2024, though they kept a secondary listing in London. Headquarters are technically in Dublin but operational control sits in New York now.
What Flutter Owns
The brand portfolio reads like a who’s who of gambling:
- FanDuel (dominant in US sports betting)
- Paddy Power
- Betfair
- PokerStars
- Sky Bet
- Sportsbet (Australia)
- Sisal (Italy)
- tombola
- TVG
Top Flutter Shareholders
| Institution | Value | Stake |
|---|---|---|
| Vanguard Group Inc. | $4.93B | 10.0% |
| Capital World Investors | $3.99B | 7.0% |
| Capital Research Global Investors | $2.91B | ~5-7% |
| Parvus Asset Management Jersey Ltd. | $2.23B | ~4.4% |
| Parvus Asset Management Europe Ltd. | $1.67B | ~3-4% |
No single billionaire controls Flutter. It is institutional money all the way down, with Vanguard alone holding nearly $5 billion worth of shares.
Entain – The Ladbrokes and Coral Parent
Entain owns the betting shops you walk past on every British high street. Ladbrokes, Coral, plus a stack of online brands including bwin, PartyPoker, Sportingbet, and Foxy Bingo. They also hold a joint venture stake in BetMGM for the American market.
Revenue hit £5.09 billion in 2024, up 7% on the prior year. Market cap floated around £4.33 billion, making them considerably smaller than Flutter but still massive by any normal measure.
Entain Top Shareholders
| Institution | Stake | Shares Held |
|---|---|---|
| Capital Research & Management | 10-20% | N/A |
| Dodge & Cox | 9.2-9.9% | N/A |
| BlackRock, Inc. | 7.2% | 18.5M |
| Vanguard Group, Inc. | 4.2-9.8% | 20.3M-27M |
| Principal Global Investors | 5.0% | 32M |
Again, no controlling billionaire. Institutions own somewhere between 65-79% of all Entain shares, with the same names appearing that you see everywhere else in this industry.
The Money Behind the Money
Here is where it gets interesting. The same handful of investment managers keep showing up regardless of which gambling company you look at.
Vanguard Group
Vanguard holds significant stakes in Flutter (10%), Entain (4.2-9.8%), and Evolution (3.10%). They are not picking winners – they are buying the entire industry through index funds and managed portfolios. When gambling grows, Vanguard profits regardless of which company does best.
BlackRock
Same story. BlackRock owns 7.2% of Entain and 4.02% of Evolution. They manage roughly $10 trillion in assets globally, so these gambling stakes are a rounding error for them, but it means your pension fund might well own a slice of Ladbrokes whether you know it or not.
Capital Group
Capital Research and Capital World Investors (both part of Capital Group) appear as major shareholders in Flutter, Entain, AND Evolution. Their combined stakes across the industry run into the billions.
Cross-Industry Holdings Summary
| Fund Manager | Flutter | Entain | Evolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vanguard | 10.0% | 4.2-9.8% | 3.10% |
| BlackRock | – | 7.2% | 4.02% |
| Capital Group | ~12-14% | 10-20% | 8.58% |
These funds have essentially hedged across the entire gambling sector. Whoever wins, they win.
The Game Makers
The companies above are mostly operators – they run the platforms where you place bets. But there is another layer to this industry: the companies that actually make the games.
Evolution AB
We covered Evolution above under Kenneth Dart, but they deserve mention here too. With €2.21 billion in operating revenue for 2024, they are the dominant force in live casino. Their acquisition spree brought in NetEnt (SEK 19.6 billion in 2020), Big Time Gaming (€450 million in 2021), and Ezugi ($12-18 million in 2018-2019).
When you see a live dealer game online, Evolution probably built it.
Pragmatic Play
Pragmatic Play has turned into one of the most prolific slot developers going. Titles like Gates of Olympus and Sweet Bonanza show up everywhere, and they release new games at a pace that makes other developers look lazy. Pragmatic Play casinos now account for a hefty chunk of the online gambling market because operators know players recognise the games.
Unlike Evolution, Pragmatic Play is not publicly traded with billionaire shareholders you can trace through SEC filings. But their games appear on virtually every major platform, which gives them enormous reach even without the headline-grabbing ownership structure.
Quick Reference
Private vs Public Operators
| Company | Status | Controlling Interest |
|---|---|---|
| Bet365 | Private | Coates Family (100%) |
| Allwyn | Private | Karel Komárek/KKCG (majority) |
| Flutter | NYSE Listed | Institutional (Vanguard largest at 10%) |
| Entain | LSE Listed | Institutional (65-79% total) |
| Evolution | Nasdaq Stockholm | Kenneth Dart (23.41%) + Institutions |
2024 Revenue Comparison
| Company | Revenue | Currency |
|---|---|---|
| Flutter | $14.04B | USD |
| Entain | £5.09B | GBP |
| Bet365 | £4.03B | GBP |
| Evolution | €2.21B | EUR |
