Rishi Sunak’s wife invests in firm linked to Qatari rulers
The multimillionaire wife of the UK chancellor, Rishi Sunak, holds stakes in a “private investment community for the next generation of global leaders” and a luxury British furniture company backed by Rupert Murdoch’s daughter.
Akshata Murty, the daughter of an Indian billionaire, married Sunak in 2009. She owns shares in dara5, a London-based investment firm cofounded in 2019 by a member of Qatar’s ruling Al-Thani family. The shareholding, via her Catamaran Ventures UK investment company, was first reported by Bloomberg on Tuesday.
Dara5 says on LinkedIn that it aims to provide a “global investment network for next generation family members, young investors & youthful entrepreneurs”. Nasser Al-Thani, “next gen family member of the Qatari Ruling Family” who studied international business management at Newcastle University, is a founding partner. According to his instagram account, he owns a large collection of supercars.
The multimillionaire co-founder of Lastminute.com Brent Hobermanis also an investor.
Filings at Companies House also show that Catamaran Ventures UK is a shareholder in the upmarket furniture marketplace The New Craftsmen. The company, which says it “curates, commissions and sells unique contemporary objects that are rooted in craftsmanship and narrative”, counts several well-known wealthy investors among its shareholders. Among them are Prudence MacLeod, the eldest child of Rupert Murdoch.
Murty set up Catamaran’s UK arm with Sunak in order to invest her private wealth. He transferred his shares to her in 2015, just before entering parliament, and she is now the sole owner. Through it she has invested in a clutch of startup businesses. Sunak declares his wife’s ownership of Catamaran on the list of
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