Adele Pays Back £2.5 Million To The UK Taxman After Dividend Blunder
Adele has reportedly paid back roughly £2.5 million to the UK taxman after a blunder meant that she was overpaid in the form of a dividend by one of her companies.
The 27 year old singer, currently the biggest pop star in the world and worth a reported £88 million, received £7 million from one of two companies of which she is the sole director. She was paid in the form of a dividend from Melted Stone Ltd, but money owed to creditors meant that the singer should have received slightly less than £4.5 million.
The mistake was quickly spotted by her accountants, who promptly paid back a little over £2.5 million to HMRC. She was also paid approximately £4.25 million by the other of her companies, Melted Stone Publishing.
“This is embarrassing,” a source told The Sun on Wednesday (June 15th). “Adele likes to portray herself as a woman of the people so an incident like this which brings attention to her massive wealth isn’t good.”
More: Bowie producer Tony Visconti questions whether Adele’s voice might be digitally “manipulated”
A spokesperson for Adele said later the same day to The Mirror: “All relevant disclosures have been made in the company accounts. As clearly stated within the report, the position has been resolved.” Later, a representative of HMRC simply stated: “We don’t discuss individual taxpayers.”
Adele is currently on the verge of parting ways with her independent label XL and signing a massive new record deal with Sony Music for a reported £90 million – the biggest ever for a British artist, more than the huge £80 million deal Robbie Williams concluded in 2002 with EMI.
She is in the middle of her massive ‘Adele Live 2016’ world tour, whose European leg concludes tonight in Antwerp, Belgium before heading off to North America in July.
More: Adele breaks down as she pays tribute to Orlando shooting victims during gig