By: The Guardian
January 14, 2020
Giovanni Ferrero, scion of the Italian chocolate empire that makes Kinder Surprise, Nutella and Ferrero Rocher, is paying himself and his family a €642m (£542m) dividend in one of Europe’s biggest-ever paydays.
The huge annual dividend payment comes as the company paid just £110,000 tax in the UK last year, despite selling £419m worth of chocolates and other snacks in Britain.
Ferrero, who is Italy’s richest man with a €29bn (£24bn) fortune, has paid himself and his family more than €2bn in dividends over the past decade. Over the same period the company, which also owns TicTacs and the UK’s 109-year-old chocolate brand Thornton’s, paid less than £500,000 in UK taxes.