Australia’s Richest 250 expand wealth from mining and tech
Australia’s three richest women control business empires worth almost $100bn as we reveal who made the top 10 in The List, worth over $230bn between them.
Australia’s three richest women control business empires worth almost $100bn, this year’s edition of The List - Australia’s Richest 250 reveals.
Billionaire mining magnate Gina Rinehart tops The List with a record-shattering $50.48bn wealth derived from her Hancock Prospecting mining empire.
Mrs Rinehart is one of three women in the top 10, published in full by The Australian on Friday.
She is joined by Nicola Forrest, who shares wealth of $37.17bn with Andrew Forrest in joint second and third position.
Ms Forrest debuts on the Richest 250 after splitting from husband Mr Forrest, the founder and executive chairman of iron ore miner and green energy hopeful Fortescue Metals Group.
Her new separate shareholding in Fortescue – it is held solely in her name while the rest of the Forrest family fortune is jointly held – accounts for her inclusion on The List, even though the duo’s wealth is combined.
The two are both billionaires and have, on paper, equally split almost all their vast Fortescue share wealth. They also have equal ownership of the private Tattarang business empire that spans cattle holdings, brands like RM Williams, Akubra, Perth commercial property and other investments.
Melanie Perkins is the other female in the top 10, sharing her estimated $10.92bn wealth with husband and Canva co-founder Cliff Obrecht.
Canva is valued at $US26bn and it now looks likely Perkins and Obrecht will take the online graphics company public, likely on a stockmarket in America, any time from mid-2025 onwards.
It would be one of the world’s most anticipated floats in recent years, and crystallise the paper fortunes of Ms Perkins and Mr Obrecht - who have pledged to give away much of their wealth to charity.
The full The List - Australia’s Richest 250 is published on March 15 online and inside The Australian.
Mrs Rinehart’s estimated wealth is up almost $13.4bn from the $37.10bn she had on last year’s edition, as Hancock’s profits keep surging, thanks to the spectacular performance of its flagship, and majority-owned, Roy Hill mine that made a $2.7bn net profit in 2023.
“If we want our standards of living to continue, along with the many thousands of high-paying jobs created by mining, and significant benefits to the regions, states and country more broadly, we must have policies which encourage investment and development of Australia’s mineral resources,” Mrs Rinehart recently said when discussing the Roy Hill profit and the importance of the mining industry to the Australian economy.
Hancock has $20bn in cash on its balance sheet, financial firepower that has seen it emerge as a major investor in other mining assets, agricultural assets based around Wagyu beef holdings and Australian brands such as Driza-Bone and Rossi Boots.
The top 10 of The List is dominated by companies that have gone global from Australia, either as exporters like Hancock Prospecting and Fortescue, or based overseas like Anthony Pratt’s Pratt Industries cardboard box maker in the US.
Mr Pratt and his family rank fourth with a $27.66bn fortune.
Others with a worldwide customer base include Canva or software firm Atlassian, founded by Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar - who rank sixth and seventh respectively with $22.92bn and $22.65bn wealth respectively.
An exception to that global rule is property legend Harry Triguboff, who has amassed his $26.01bn fortune, ranking him fifth, entirely from building apartments in Sydney and the Gold Coast for the past 61 years.
“I used to look out from Sydney’s Dover Heights to Bondi Beach. There were no apartments. In China, England, Israel we had them, but we didn’t have them in Australia, and I knew there was a big demand for them,” said the 91-year-old Triguboff, explaining why he switched from a career in textiles to property.
Other billionaires in the top 10 include Clive Palmer, in eighth position with wealth of $21.92bn and Kerry Stokes, whose media and mining services empire is worth $11.01bn.
The full 2024 edition of The List is published on Friday in a special issue contained in The Australian, and will reveal how industries such as property, manufacturing and fashion are thriving, along with emerging players in cryptocurrency, e-commerce and other tech related firms.
