Christopher Harborne
Born December 1962 (age 63)
Other name Chakrit Sakunkrit
Citizenship United Kingdom, Thailand
Education Westminster School
Alma mater Downing College, Cambridge
INSEAD
Title Chief Executive Officer
Board member of
Sherriff Global Group

Christopher Charles Sherriff Harborne (born December 1962) is a British-Thai billionaire businessman and technology investor based in Thailand.[1][2] He holds Thai citizenship under the name Chakrit Sakunkrit.[3] He is best known for filing a defamation lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal for reporting related to his work in the cryptocurrency industry, as well as his donations to British political parties. He previously donated to the UK's Conservative Party and is the largest single donor to Reform UK.

In the Sunday Times Rich List 2026 ranking of the wealthiest people with UK residence he was placed 6th with an estimated fortune of £18.177 billion.[4]

Early life and education

Christopher Harborne was born on 18 December 1962 in Mosborough, Sheffield, to Edgar Harborne, an insurance investor, and homemaker Joan. He is a descendant of English writer R. C. Sherriff and has two siblings, including his late sister Katharine.[5] He went to Westminster School. He took an MA and MEng from Downing College, Cambridge.[6] In 1988, he gained an MBA from the Institut européen d'administration des affaires (INSEAD).[7]

Career

Harborne worked for five years as a management consultant at McKinsey and Co., before running a research company in Asia. He describes himself as an "investor in new tech, including open software blockchain platforms".[8][9] He is the CEO of Sherriff Global Group which trades in private planes, and the owner of AML Global, a firm that sells aviation fuel.[10] He is a billionaire.[1][2] He has made a donation to enable the founding of INSEAD San Francisco and to create a Blockchain Research Fund.[7] He has set up a company, Singular AI Consulting Limited, with cryptocurrency miner Marco Streng.[8] As of December 2019, he is based in Thailand.[8][11] According to The Times, Harborne's name "features in the Panama Papers as an intermediary of companies linked to offshore accounts".[12]

Political donations

Harborne donated more than £6m to the Brexit Party in 2019,[8] £3 million in the summer[10] and £3 million before the United Kingdom general election in 2019,[8] making him the largest donor that year.[11]

Before switching his donations to the Brexit Party,[13] Harborne had donated smaller sums, averaging £15,000 per annum since 2001 totalling about £270,000, to the Conservative Party. In November 2022, Harborne donated £1 million to The Office of Boris Johnson Ltd, one of the biggest donations ever made to an individual British politician.[14] The government awarded Qinetiq, a company in which Harborne was the largest single shareholder, an £80 million Ministry of Defence contract in January 2023.[15] He acted as an advisor to Boris Johnson on his trip to Kyiv in September 2023 to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy.[16]

In 2024 he gifted £5 million to Nigel Farage, shortly before Farage announced that he had decided to stand as a candidate in that year's general election.[17] Farage did not declare this gift at the time. This gift was disputed in May 2026 as to whether it constituted a donation that should be registered.[18][19] Farage did not disclose the donation and in May 2026 the Electoral Commission and the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards began investigations.[20]

Harborne donated £9 million to Reform UK (the new name for the Brexit Party) in 2025, and a further £3 million in March 2026, making him the largest single donator to a UK political party in a financial year in UK history.[21][22][23] As of April 2026 his donations to Reform UK amount to more than £22 million in total, roughly two-thirds of all the party's donations since its foundation.[24]

Dispute with The Wall Street Journal

In March 2023, The Wall Street Journal published an article about banking arrangements for the cryptocurrency companies Tether and Bitfinex which linked Harborne and his aviation fuel company AML Global Ltd to those arrangements. The article alleged that AML Global had helped the companies gain access to the U.S. banking system by concealing their identities and suggested that Harborne had misrepresented his ownership of a minority stake in Bitfinex and Tether under his Thai name 'Chakrit Sakunkrit' when opening a bank account at Signature Bank.[25]

In February 2024, Harborne filed a defamation suit against Dow Jones & Company, the Journal's publisher, in the Superior Court of Delaware. He alleged the article falsely accused him of fraud, money laundering and terrorism financing and of operating a shell company for illicit purposes and that AML Global never handled funds for Tether or Bitfinex.[26]

References

  1. ^ a b Lewis, Jane (12 December 2025). "Who is Christopher Harborne, crypto billionaire and Reform UK's new mega-donor?". MoneyWeek. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  2. ^ a b Evans, Holly (5 March 2026). "Who is the British billionaire behind £9m Reform donation?". The Independent. Retrieved 26 February 2026.
  3. ^ Zorzut, Adrian (22 September 2020). "Nigel Farage refuses to answer questions about £10m Brexit Party donor with two separate identities". The New European. Archived from the original on 1 October 2020.
  4. ^ "The Sunday Times Rich List 2026 revealed". The Times. 15 May 2026. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
  5. ^ Burgis, Tom; Siradapuvadol, Navaon; Mason, Rowena; Dyer, Henry (25 April 2026). "'Nigel is mad to accept his money': who is Christopher Harborne, the mystery billionaire bankrolling Reform?". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  6. ^ "Christopher Harborne". Fellows' directory. Downing College Cambridge. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  7. ^ a b "Christopher Harborne MBA'88J makes founding gift for INSEAD San Francisco and supports blockchain research". INSEAD. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  8. ^ a b c d e "Man in the Eye: Christopher Harborne". Private Eye. No. 1511. 13 December 2019. p. 10.
  9. ^ Kennedy, Dominic; Wright, Oliver (27 November 2019). "Christopher Harborne: Brexit Party's bankroller has a Thai doppelgänger". The Times. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  10. ^ a b Tolhurst, Alain (26 November 2019). "Former Tory donor gave Brexit Party £3m donation, new figures reveal". PoliticsHome. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  11. ^ a b D'Arcy, Mark (7 December 2019). "General election 2019: Who is paying for the election?". BBC News. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  12. ^ Wright, Oliver (26 November 2019). "Businessman with Panama Papers links gives £3 million to Brexit Party". The Times. Retrieved 26 April 2026.
  13. ^ Buchan, Lizzy (29 August 2019). "Brexit Party receives more than £1m in donations amid speculation over snap election". The Independent. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  14. ^ Walker, Peter (12 January 2023). "Boris Johnson given £1m donation by former Brexit party backer". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  15. ^ Fitzpatrick, Jim (19 January 2023). "Defence firm part-owned by Johnson's £1m donor wins £80m MoD contract". openDemocracy. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  16. ^ Burgis, Tom (10 October 2025). "The £1m man: why did Boris Johnson take his donor to Ukraine?". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  17. ^ Isaac, Anna (29 April 2026). "Farage's attempt to get ahead of £5m gift story only raises more questions". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  18. ^ Pike, Joe; Wheeler, Brian (29 April 2026). "Farage received £5m from donor before he became MP". BBC News. Retrieved 7 May 2026.
  19. ^ Isaac, Anna (29 April 2026). "Exclusive: Nigel Farage was given undisclosed £5m by crypto billionaire in 2024". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 May 2026.
  20. ^ Quinn, Ben (1 May 2026). "Watchdog weighs investigation into Farage's undisclosed £5m gift". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 May 2026.
  21. ^ Morton, Becky (4 December 2025). "Crypto investor donates record £9m to Reform UK". BBC News. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  22. ^ Macaskill, Andrew (5 March 2026). "Nigel Farage's Reform UK party lands second big donation from crypto investor". Reuters. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  23. ^ Mason, Rowena (5 March 2026). "Crypto investor based in Thailand donates further £3m to Reform". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  24. ^ Monbiot, George (30 April 2026). "Political donations are poison to our democracy – but there's an easy antidote to that". The Guardian. Retrieved 30 April 2026.
  25. ^ "United State Securities and Exchange Commission | Washington, D.C. 20549 | Schedule 13D". dealpointdata.com. Retrieved 29 April 2026.
  26. ^ "Christopher Harborne, et al. v. Dow Jones & Company, Inc. d/b/a The Wall Street Journal". Justia. 23 December 2024. Retrieved 29 April 2026.