Royal Mail bet delivers for Daniel Kretinsky | Business

A Czech billionaire has made more than £500 million on paper by taking on short-sellers and betting on Royal Mail and J Sainsbury.

Daniel Kretinsky, known as the Czech Sphinx for his inscrutable nature, started building a stake in Royal Mail last spring after its shares tanked during the markets’ coronavirus slump.

At the time short-sellers including BlackRock, the world’s biggest money manager, and GLG Partners, the hedge fund, were betting that the stock would continue to fall. Yet Royal Mail emerged as a winner of the pandemic amid an online shopping boom.

Through his Vesa Equity Investment vehicle, Kretinsky, 45, who is worth £3 billion according to Forbes, first bought Royal Mail shares last March when they were about 154p and he