How Stoke City's owner John Coates created a net worth of £3.2 billion | OneFootball

Coates has been involved with the Potters in some ownership capacity for the last nine years

Stoke City were first backed by the Coates family in 1986, and the club is still run by their local billionaire supporters to this day, nearly 40 years on.

Stoke-on-Trent born Peter Coates became majority shareholder at Stoke and was appointed chairman in September 1986 with the club in the second-tier, and held that position for over 12 years before he resigned from his position in 1998 amid fierce criticism from supporters, but stayed on as a director.

Fast-forward eight more years, and the Coates family took charge of the Potters once again, with the club in sizeable debt and in mid-table obscurity in the Championship, yet they managed to guide Stoke back to the top-flight for the first time since 1985 in 2008.

The Potters have since been run by Peter himself, with his son John as his vice-chairman, then the pair of them became co-owners in 2020, and John was appointed full-time owner of the club in the summer of 2024 as the club went through a structural change.

Stoke City owner John Coates made his money from gambling

bet365 have been a long-term sponsor at Stoke

The Coates' have long been regarded as some of the richest owners in England in terms of outright wealth, and they displayed those riches by clearing all of the club's debt as part of their ownership change in the summer, despite Stoke's last few years of struggles in the Championship.

According to Forbes, John Coates' net worth currently sits at around $4.2 billion as it stands, which roughly equates to £3.23 billion, meaning he is the 832nd richest person in the world right now, according to their calculations.

John's dad, Peter, initially made his wealth through founding Stadia Catering in the 1960s and local radio station Signal in 1983, while he also started Provincial Racing, a bookmaking firm, which went on to be the start of an empire of betting that has made the family who they are today.

Gambling company bet365 was founded by John and his sister, Denise Coates, in Stoke in 2001, and it quickly became one of the leading betting sites worldwide in the new age of online gambling, and is still one of the biggest of its kind to this day.

John had initially trained as a lawyer but was convinced by his sister to co-launch the company, and he can certainly have no regrets, as the pair are still co-CEOs now, with him owning a quarter of the business outright.

John Coates' net-worth compared to Premier League owners

Stoke owner's net-worth sits between Crystal Palace and Leicester City

Coates is one of the richest owners in the Championship as a result of his £3.23b net worth, but when that figure is compared to clubs in the Premier League, it is below 13 different owners, but above the likes of Leicester City, Everton, Bournemouth, Brighton, Southampton, Nottingham Forest and Brentford.

The likes of Newcastle United, Manchester United and Manchester City all understandably sit at the top of the wealth table in the top-flight, but it may come as a surprise that Coates' net worth is close to Tottenham Hotspur owners Daniel Levy and Joe Lewis, given the contrasting positions of the two sides.