Billionaire Richard White backs away from questionable property deals amid board crisis talks

Beleaguered tech billionaire Richard White has moved to distance himself from questionable private property deals as the board of the company he founded, WiseTech Global, holds crisis talks following further allegations of inappropriate behaviour by White.

The global logistics software company is in a trading halt as the board tells the market it hoped to provide an update on “governance issues” by Monday at the latest.

Richard White with his wife, Zena Nasser. The pair married in the US in 2024.Credit:

A joint investigation by The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Australian Financial Review recently revealed that more women, including a WiseTech employee and a contractor, had made formal complaints alleging inappropriate behaviour by White.

The billionaire stepped down as chief executive in October last year following allegations of bullying and intimidation made by a former female board member as well as a confidential settlement he’d reached with a former lover who’d made allegations of inappropriate conduct against White, which he denied.

Meanwhile, White has called in a $70 million loan he made to an associate of his wife’s former husband, Mark Merhi, a 50-year-old failed property developer who fled to Dubai in 2022 with corporate debts of $80 million.

Merhi was also a suspect in several firebombings of business premises his construction company had disputes with as well as the CFMEU’s office in Lidcombe in Sydney’s west.

Mark Merhi sold his development site at 366 The Horsley Drive, Fairfield at a substantial loss.Credit: Domain

Two of the three property developments White’s company has been bankrolling were sold by Merhi to his associate Ahmad Ahmad, a nut roaster from Lakemba.

White was introduced to Ahmad and the three properties in Sydney’s west by Merhi, the ex-husband of White’s wife Zena Nasser. White’s private company RealWise Financing advanced the loans to companies owned by Ahmad between 2023 and 2024.

When previously asked how he had come to borrow money from one of Australia’s richest men and whether he knew White’s wife, Zena Nasser, Ahmad said, “I cannot comment on anything, I am very busy,” before hanging up.

After the financing arrangement was revealed by this masthead, White moved to extricate himself from any dealings with Merhi and his associates.

A video posted on TikTok appears to show Richard White and his wife, Zena Nasser, celebrating with Mark (second from right) and Khalil Merhi (far right).Credit:

Written notice to terminate the loan agreements was provided on February 11, 2025. Ahmad has been given a month to repay the loans, including interest.

“The decision has been made not to proceed with the acquisition of any of the three properties,” White said.

White said neither he, nor any of his companies, will have any business relationship with Ahmad or companies he controls once the loans are repaid.

Just as his property empire was collapsing, Merhi sold one of the three developments, an Aldi site in Fairfield, to Ahmad for $13.5 million in September 2020. This was $5.5 million less than Merhi’s company had paid for it five years earlier.

Helm Advisory liquidator Stephen Hathway told creditors the sale may have been an uncommercial transaction as the site “had potential sale value of $23,300,000”, in an October 2022 report. The report noted further investigation was required, but the liquidator ran out of funding to pursue the matter. Another of the properties – in Second Avenue, Blacktown – was also sold by a Merhi firm to Ahmad.

White has previously told this masthead that “Mark Merhi (who is the father of my stepdaughter) introduced the refinancing deal to me. Which I passed to my finance and legal team for consideration.”

The billionaire was also aware that Merhi knew Ahmad. “It was through that introduction that the refinancing arrangement for [Ahmad’s company] Scraper was organised,” he said in a previous statement.

However, White was not aware of the colourful backgrounds of the Merhis, Ahmad and their associates.

‘I cannot comment on anything, I am very busy.’

Lakemba nut roaster Ahmad Ahmad on how he came to borrow money from one of Australia’s richest men.

Merhi and his brother, Khalil, were suspects in a firebombing investigation in the mid-2000s. Coroner Michael Barnes found in 2016 the four fires, including one at the CFMEU’s Lidcombe office, were linked to organisations or people who’d had “confrontations or disagreements with Khalil Merhi and/or Mark Merhi”. But there was not enough evidence to make conclusive findings, and no charges were ever laid.

Nasser had previously represented her brother-in-law Khalil Merhi in a dispute with the construction union, over which he was fined $12,000.

In 2020, the NSW building commissioner David Chandler described a 16-storey Auburn Road apartment tower built by one of the Merhi companies as “an abomination”. He said the building ticked “about every box” in failing to meet critical benchmarks in fire safety, structure, waterproofing and building enclosures.

Merhi is facing prosecution for his failure to comply with rectification orders regarding the Auburn tower block. The matter is likely to remain in limbo, with Merhi out of the jurisdiction.

One of Ahmad’s close business associates is developer Joseph Samia, 51. The pair has other developments in Prestons, Botany and a former mine site 30 kilometres outside Bathurst.

The NSW Crime Commission examined Samia in 2015 about his knowledge of a Leichhardt property that was the subject of a proceeds-of-crime application. Marouf El Hassan, who was jailed for a maximum of 15 years in relation to a cocaine importation from Panama, had allegedly purchased the property at a substantial discount. The outcome of the examination is not known. Ahmad was not involved in the property.

Samia has also been in business with Savas Guven, a Mosman property developer, who is facing a three-month-long trial in August 2025 over one of Australia’s biggest drug importations. Since Guven was refused bail, Samia has become a director with Guven’s wife, Jade, of Rhodes Station Property Holdings, which purchased a $4.5 million property in Rhodes. The property has a NSW Crime Commission caveat on the title to prevent its sale.

White initially lent Ahmad’s firm $5 million before advancing a further $3 million in May 2023. After White established a new subsidiary, Realwise Finance, in March 2023, the volume of money being lent kept rising.

According to an August 2023 facility agreement between Realwise Finance and Ahmad’s company, the WiseTech founder was providing $53 million for the developments, an amount that increased to $70 million in 2024, according to deeds obtained by this masthead. White then set up discretionary trusts in November 2024 to acquire the properties and finish their development.

However, those trusts will be renamed and will hold other investments.

White said he has never had a business or financial relationship with Merhi or any of his relatives.

“They have never lived in any properties that I own, and they have never received any money or any other pecuniary benefit from myself or any of my businesses.”

White said his businesses and personal officer will expand its background checking to add extensive criminal and adverse media checks.

“A review of all current investments will also be undertaken,” he said.

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