The billionaire Tory donor Alan Howard – who hired Lady Gaga sing at his Italian wedding last year – collected £82m in annual pay from his hedge fund. Brevan Howard Asset Management LLP paid Howard, who co-founded the fund in 2002, a total £82,038,938 in pay in the year to the end of March 2022 according to accounts filed at Companies House on Wednesday. His pay increased 46% on the £56m paid out a year earlier despite a 20% drop in profits to £105m. He stepped down as chief executive in 2019, but is still the ultimate controlling party via a bank in the Cayman Islands. A spokesperson for the fund declined to comment. Howard, 59, one of Britain’s richest men with a fortune estimated at almost £2bn, has donated at least £630,000 to the Conservative Party since 2019 according to Electoral Commission records. He is also a big charity donor to causes including homelessness and Holocaust education. Howard co-founded the business in 2002 with fellow Credit Suisse traders Jean-Philippe Blochet, Chris Rokos, James Vernon and Trifon Natsis. The firm grew to become the world’s fourth-largest hedge fund within seven years, with £20bn under management. Last summer he hired Lady Gaga to belt out her greatest hits at his wedding party. The singer, who is said to charge about a $1m for private shows, performed at his Lake Como wedding to Caroline Byron, a New York chef. Howard’s earnings beat those of rival fund manager Terry Smith, who received a record £36m payout last year despite the poor performance of his flagship Fundsmith Equity fund. Smith’s company Fundsmith LLP made a profit of £58.2m for the year to March 2022, up slightly from £57.7m the year before, according to accounts filed at Companies House. Under the company’s profit-sharing arrangements, the member with the largest entitlement, who is thought to be Smith, received a £36.5m profit share, an increase from £35.7m a year earlier. Fundsmith LLP, which oversees investments in London, Delaware, and Luxembourg, paid £251.7m in fees to Fundsmith Investment Services, a business based in Mauritius, where Smith lives.