Denise Coates, dubbed the "silent queen of internet betting," is one of the most successful (and unassuming) business executives in the United Kingdom. Denise Coates is the co-CEO of bet365, one of the world's largest online gambling companies, alongside her brother John Coates. Denise is Britain's highest-paid CEO, earning £421 million (about $508 million) in 2020.

Coates, unlike other prominent figures in the online gaming industry, pays her society dues.

The gaming mogul has led the Sunday Times Tax List for three years in a row and yearly donates millions of pounds to charity.

Since its inception in 2001, bet365 has grown exponentially from humble beginnings in a Stoke-on-Trent parking lot to a multi-billion-pound gambling empire and ownership of Stoke City Football Club.

The bookmaker now has more than 6 million clients in over 200 countries.

But how did Denise Coates transform her father's little sports betting portfolio into a multibillion-pound business? It all comes down to her strong work ethic and forward-thinking outlook.

Early Life

Aside from a few luxuries here and there, Denise Coates prefers to live under the radar.

In an interview with the Guardian, Coates said: “The public side does not come naturally to me. I’m not saying I’m a shrinking violet – I’m not. I’ve been bossy all my life. It’s just that I very much enjoy actually running the business.”

Other than the fact that she was born on 26th September 1967, this admittance of an early personality trait is pretty much all we know about the billionaire tycoon’s childhood.

With so little information available about her early life, it’s safe to assume that her formative years were relatively uneventful (at least as far as Coates is willing to admit).

Instead, let’s focus on her relationship with her father, Peter Coates, and the early days of her career.

Like Father, Like Daughter

Peter Coates was the son of a miner and grew up in poverty. At the age of 14, Peter had to leave school and start an office job to support his family. As an adult, he was determined to create a better life from a young age.

Following an obligatory stint in the British army, Coates began working for a chain restaurant, where he climbed through the ranks. He eventually left to open his own catering firm, which focused on providing catering services to sporting events.

The success of his catering business allowed Coates to invest in a chain of betting shops which he named Provincial Racing.

Through these shops, he began to cultivate his success, and by 1989 he was a principal shareholder of his hometown’s football club, Stoke City. However, his bookmaker portfolio had nowhere near reached its full potential.

Around the same time, his eldest daughter Denise graduated from the University of Sheffield with a first-class degree in econometrics.

Denise took on a job at Provincial Racing, which she later dubbed “a small chain of pretty rubbish betting shops.” Nevertheless, she soon became an effective catalyst for its growth.

Under her direction the no-frills betting chain became increasingly profitable and so, thanks to her diligent efforts and work ethic, Denise was made Managing Director in 1995.

The Rise Of Bet365

The giant that is bet365 today would not exist if it weren’t for Denise’s visionary investment 22 years ago.

Coates realized the potential of the internet and believed that it would revolutionize the future of sports betting. She bought the domain bet365.com in January 2000 from an online seller for £20,000 (approx. $25,000).

After convincing her brother (who had been practicing as an attorney) to join her business venture, Denise met with London’s capitalist elite to secure investors.

Unable to convince a single one of them, she then turned to the Royal Bank of Scotland, who granted her a loan of around £14 ($17) million with the entire Provincial Racing chain as collateral.

Denise wasted no time and launched bet365.com in 2001.

For a long time, Coates worked around the clock from a Portakabin in the car park of one of the family’s betting shops. Though online betting was slowly gaining traction on the internet, Denise was the first to fully invest in its potential.

In doing so, she carved out the future for a billion-dollar empire with over 5,000 employees. 

Coates acknowledges the enormous risks that surrounded her decision to invest in online gambling, dubbing herself and her brother “the ultimate gamblers.” Luckily for Denise (and her father’s betting chain), her gamble paid off.

Eventually, bet365 became so successful that Provincial Racing was no longer a necessary asset for the Coates family, and it was sold to Coral Betting in 2015 for £40 ($50) million.

The success of bet365 also enabled Denise to fulfil her father’s football passions once more. Stoke City FC, of which Peter had been the majority shareholder from 1986 to 1998, was purchased by bet365 in 2006 for £1.7 ($2) million.

Though the team has not seen much improvement since then, it holds a lot of sentimental value for the Coates family, who recently cleared £160 million (approx. $197 million) of the club’s debt.

Britain’s Top-Billed Boss

Despite taking a pay cut of £170 ($209) million in 2021, Denise Coates is the highest-paid company executive in the UK, let alone the highest-paid of all British female executives.

Though she runs one of the most successful bookmakers in the world (in one of the most male-dominated industries imaginable), Denise never felt that her gender impeded her work or resulted in different treatment from other industry leaders.

Coates claimed that while there were a few meetings where she “had to put somebody right”, she also said, “I knew my business, so it wasn’t a problem.”

On the other hand, Denise acknowledges – without irritation – that people often assume her father runs the bet365 business.

She attributes these “false assumptions” to the fact that “the media decides, for whatever reason, that maybe it makes a better story if they say he does.”

It’s not hard to see why her position as co-CEO and majority shareholder can be confusing to some. Because of her desire for complete privacy, Denise is not mentioned by name in the company accounts.

Instead, it’s merely the “highest-paid director” that took home the £250 million (approx. $308 million) pay package in 2021.

Denise Coates’ exact net worth has been a topic of debate over the past several years. At the time of writing, Forbes’ real-time net worth data places the figure at £3.8 billion (or around $4.8 billion).

Meanwhile, the bet365 company reported revenue of £2.81 billion (approx. $3.5 billion) in March 2021.