Richest 250: Shahin brothers top SA’s richest people list in 2021

They are SA’s richest people. Worth billions and living in homes the rest of us can only dream of, the Richest 250 list dives into their lives.

Meet SA’s richest people. Worth billions and living in homes the rest of us can only dream of, the Richest 250 list dives into their lives to find the secret to their success.

Shahin brothers

The three brothers behind the biggest private business in South Australia, Peregrine Corporation, share the biggest fortune in the state.

Khalil, Samer and Yasser Shahin’s wealth reaches a combined $1.93bn this year on The List — Australia’s Richest 250, to be published Saturday in The Weekend Australian.

Sam Shahin and his brothers have topped the SA rich list off the back of Peregrine Corporation. Picture: Matt Turner

Peregrine has grown from a business established by their late father Fred Shahin in 1984 with a small BP service station in Woodville Park, to one that now has 5000 employees.

The business has annual revenue of more than $2bn across the OTR convenience store chain, Smokemart and Giftbox, as well as The Bend Motorsport Park and a range of property holdings.

Chris Thomas

The second wealthiest South Australian is Chris Thomas, whose Thomas Foods International has started work on its $300 million meat processing plant at Murray Bridge to replace the facility destroyed by fire three years ago.

Thomas Foods has annual revenue of almost $2bn, employs more than 2000 people and exports meat and fish to more than 80 countries.

Nick DiMauro

Property owner Nick DiMauro is next with a $763m fortune. He owns a string of shopping centres, including Sefton Plaza and Aberfoyle Hub.

The List also has a South Australian flavour with property magnates Shaun Bonett and Con Makris, both of whom have moved interstate in recent years after making their fortunes with Adelaide real estate.

Property owner Nick DiMauro made his fortune through shopping centres.

Bonett, the head of Precision Group, owns Port Adelaide Plaza and Adelaide Central and the Customs House commercial office building. His fortune is estimated at $1.61bn, including a majority stake in the fast-growing online gift card company Prezzee.

Makris, now based on the Gold Coast, is estimated to be worth $1.11bn. He sold two Adelaide centres, the City Cross Shopping Centre for $60m, and North Adelaide Village for $50m, in February.

SUCCESS IN THE TIME OF COVID

The overall wealth of Australia’s richest 250 individuals and family groups rose from $377 billion this time last year to $470 billion today.

In the ultra-elite top five, who are all worth more than $20 billion, the biggest slip was Anthony Pratt and family, whose fortune is founded on the Visy packaging empire. It was an excellent year for cardboard (remember all those boxes the postie was slinging over your front fence?), which meant the Pratts’ wealth grew by around $5 billion – but that wasn’t enough to keep the Pratts in the coveted top spot.

The Pratts, who today are worth $21.27 billion, slipped from first in 2020 to fifth place because of the breathtaking growth in wealth by the other multi-billionaires.

Leading the charge was mining tycoon Gina Rinehart, who grew her wealth from $16.25b in 2020 to $36.28b today and is now in the number one position.

Rinehart can thank the booming iron ore price (fuelled by China’s steelmaking roaring back to life after the initial outbreak), and so can fellow mining magnate Andrew Forrest, in second place with a total wealth of $29.61b (up from $7.43b in 2020).

In third and fourth places are Atlassian founders Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar at $21.99b and $21.95b respectively, each having grown his wealth by more than $9 billion in a year.

The full 2021 edition of The List - Australia’s Richest 250 is published Saturday in The Weekend Australian.