Trucking and logistics just the beginning of Lindsay Fox’s legacy

Lindsay Fox is synonymous with trucks, but they’re far from the only thing making him rich.

Lindsay Fox established trucking and logistics giant Linfox in 1956. Picture: David Caird

Billionaire Lindsay Fox is best known for having made his considerable fortune in trucking and logistics and for his wide circle of friends among the Melbourne entrepreneur community.

His investment strategies straddle both, in terms of private holdings and also the listed shares Fox owns.

Lindsay Fox

Age: 81
Lives: Melbourne
Net worth: $3.52 billion
Source: Transport giant Linfox
Secrets of sucess: Growing Linfox from one truck and buying assets like business hub Essendon fields.

Fox established what is now trucking and logistics giant Linfox in 1956, and still has a firm grip on its strategy despite attempts to carve up the empire among his children as part of a succession plan yet to be finalised.

Linfox’s most recent accounts lodged with the corporate regulator show a business spanning trucking, warehouses and property, logistics operations such as the January purchase of Aurizon’s Queensland intermodal operations, airports and the Armaguard cash business, all of which brought in $2.5 billion in annual ­revenue.

The business made a profit of more than $100 million for the year. Linfox’s accounts also show that the business has about $450m worth of property assets, intangible assets including goodwill of $366m and more than $100m cash in the bank.

Fox and his family also own assets such as 50 per cent of Melbourne’s Essendon Airport, which is estimated to be worth almost $800m after debt with a book value of $1bn. Essendon Fields includes the largest amount of car dealerships in the southern hemisphere and the Hyatt Place hotel, which hosted former Labor Party leader Bill Shorten’s election night gathering last month.

The billionaire and his close friend Max Beck, also a member of The List of the Richest 250, published by The Australian, bought the airport from the federal government for about $21m in 2001 and have since also built retail outlets and office blocks on the land surrounding the airport, which is still operational.

Fox’s classic car collection in Melbourne’s Docklands is estimated to be worth more than $20m, and he also owns prestige property in Melbourne’s Toorak and down at Portsea on the Mornington Peninsula.

Then there is the mixture of ASX-listed shares that Fox owns, including some small but well-performing stocks. One is the listed trucking and logistics minnow Chalmers, in which Fox owns a 21 per cent stake.

Fox spent several months in 2017 and the year before building up his stake in the group, but has not bought an additional share since December that year.

Shares in Chalmers are down about 5 per cent since January 1 but have increased by about 14 per cent in the past 12 months. Fox’s stake in the company is worth about $6.5m.

Chalmers has market capitalisation of about $31m but has about $34m worth of property in the Melbourne suburbs of Brooklyn and Yarraville sitting on its balance sheet, the company’s latest accounts for the six months to ­December 31 show.

But the property could be worth more than $40m under a sale and leaseback deal, Chalmers management has told investors, and even $50m if they are rezoned for use as commercial and residential property.

The company’s property has been earmarked as a key strategic site for renewal and planning by the Victorian Planning Authority.

Fox also holds shares in another listed transport and logistics company, K&S Corporation. Once headed by the late transport magnate Allan Scott (his family remains its biggest shareholder), K&S has market capitalisation of close to $220m.

The company’s shares are up about 20 per since January 1, with Fox now having a stake worth about $36m.

In March, K&S lodged a substantial shareholder notice showing Fox had spent the previous 12 months steadying accumulating shares in dozens of on-market transactions and dividend reinvestment issues to take his shareholding to 17.05 per cent.

However, Fox’s biggest shareholding for an Australian listed company is an outfit run by another long-time friend, retail giant Premier Investments headed by chairman and billionaire Solomon Lew.

Fox was a non-executive director of Premier, which owns brands such as children’s ­accessories and stationery chain Smiggle, Peter Alexander, Dotti and Just Jeans, for 21 years before stepping down from its board in July last year.

But Fox is still among the 10 biggest shareholders in Premier, along with the likes of Lew and another billionaire in Hamish Douglass’s fund manager, Magellan Financial Group.

Premier shares having increased by about 16 per cent since the beginning of the year and Fox’s stake in the group is worth about $45m.