Hubris and decadence take their toll on Clive Palmer

It takes a special effort to squander a $US415 million windfall in less than 10 years, but Clive Palmer looks like he’s almost done it.

As a grim-faced Palmer sat in the Supreme Court in Perth yesterday to watch his own QC ­describe his business empire as being close to collapse, some wondered how a man who has long projected an image of extravagant wealth could have arrived at such a massive crisis.

In 2006, just as the mining boom was ramping up, Palmer struck a once-in-a-lifetime deal to sell his Pilbara iron ore tenements to the Chinese government-owned company Citic for a whopping $US415m (then $567m).

With that sort of cash in hand, Clive went spending.

He started building a replica of the Titanic, bought his own soccer team and amassed a collection of private jets and boats.

He famously built a dinosaur theme park, known as Palmer­sauras, at his Coolum resort in Queensland — although the 160 giant replicas failed to halt a ­decline in visitor numbers.

Palmer, the generous boss, even had the money to buy $10m worth of luxury cars and inter­national holidays for workers at his Queensland Nickel refinery in 2008, the same refinery that now faces imminent collapse with the loss of 776 jobs.

At the height of his hubris, he created the Palmer United Party and spent $30m on election campaigning to win seats in parliament.

He also wanted to be seen as a philanthropist by promising to donate $100m of his wealth ­towards Aboriginal communities in the Pilbara as part of an overall giveaway of $1 billion to charities across Australia.

None of that money has been paid, and likely never will.

Palmer’s big problem is that he used that 2006 jackpot to invest in assets that are either generating little income or losing him millions of dollars.

The Queensland Nickel refinery has been hit by a slump in nickel prices, prompting Palmer to go cap in hand to the Queensland government to beg for $25m in emergency assistance.

His iron ore investment with Citic has been a disaster of epic proportions. The bitter falling out between the two parties over royalties — a fight that should have been resolved long ago in ­mediation — has led to Palmer blowing tens of millions of dollars on legal fees.

The biggest blow came when he had to repay more than $20m to Citic after taking money from a port fund and using it to bankroll PUP’s 2013 election campaign.

Any chance that Palmer will ever receive royalties from the Sino Iron project is shrinking rapidly as the courtroom battle drags on and the iron ore price continues to collapse (hitting an 11-year low yesterday of $US39.40 a tonne).

Meanwhile, Palmer’s ASX-­listed Australasian Resources — which once harboured dreams of building its own iron ore mine in the Pilbara — remains suspended from the ASX over its failure to lodge financial accounts for the ­financial year that ended on June 30. His flagship vehicle, Mineralogy, brought in just $4m in ­revenue last year and had spending of $29m.

The self-proclaimed billionaire’s public mantra is to blame the Chinese for all of his cashflow issues.

But if his empire goes under, he should consider the years of decadent spending and hostile litigation that have done such irretrievable damage.