Friday newspaper round-up: Bet365, Greencore, NI hikes

Denise Coates, head of gambling empire Bet365, was Britain’s biggest taxpayer last year, according to the Sunday Times Tax List.The Coates family paid an estimated £481.7m, topping the annual ranking of billionaires’ tax payments for the third consecutive year. While the family’s tax payment was down from £573m in 2020, it was still almost £200m more that paid by hedge fund manager Chris Rokos in second-place with a £300m payment to the exchequer. - Guardian

Investors in Greencore, the sandwich-maker that supplies UK retailers including Marks & Spencer, narrowly failed on Thursday to block plans to pay out hundreds of thousands of pounds in executive bonuses, after outrage at the company’s failure to refund any of the near-£30m it received in government support during the pandemic. At the firm’s annual general meeting, 46% of investors joined a rebellion against the Dublin-based company’s scheme to reward directors with bonus shares. - Guardian

One of the Conservative Party's most senior backbenchers has joined calls for Rishi Sunak to delay his National Insurance raid, as a string of businesses warned the £13bn tax increase will force them to put up prices. Mel Stride, chairman of the Treasury Select Committee, said “the stars have aligned” to give the Chancellor fiscal breathing space to postpone the hike, which threatens to compound a cost of living crisis faced by millions of households. - Telegraph

The unprecedented £117 million payday for Jupiter Asset Management and two of its star stockpickers for running a listed investment fund was partly due to a higher-than-normal valuation placed on Klarna. Chrysalis Investments used a less conservative methodology to value Klarna than other shareholders in the “buy now, pay later” credit business, estimating that it had rocketed in value from £93.5 million in September 2020 to £387 million in September 2021. - The Times

Businesses have urged Rishi Sunak to delay the rise in national insurance contributions to give them more time to recover from the impact of Covid restrictions. Fifty-nine per cent of 750 businesses surveyed by the British Chambers of Commerce believe that the chancellor and the government did not adequately assess the impact of Plan B measures on companies. - The Times