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Billionaires Behind Red Bull Split $617 Million Special Dividend

Billionaires Behind Red Bull Split $617 Million Special Dividend

(Bloomberg) -- The world’s largest energy-drink maker has paid a juicy bonus to its 12 billionaire shareholders.

Red Bull GmbH distributed a 500 million euro ($617.3 million) special dividend in 2017, according to an undated resolution published on the Austrian company register. The payout came on top of 263.4 million euros in regular dividends for 2016, equal to half the firm’s profit that year.

The payment is a 374 million euro windfall for closely held Red Bull’s co-founder and biggest shareholder, Dietrich Mateschitz. The Austrian billionaire owns a 49 percent stake in the company and has a fortune valued at $15.2 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The rest of Red Bull is shared among 11 members of the Yoovidhya family of Thailand.

Red Bull sold more than 6 billion cans of its signature caffeinated beverage last year and had 6.3 billion euros in revenue.

--With assistance from Boris Groendahl

To contact the reporter on this story: Devon Pendleton in London at dpendleton@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Pierre Paulden at ppaulden@bloomberg.net, Peter Eichenbaum

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.