Australia's 10 wealthiest people revealed
The 2019 Rich List is one for the record books: 91 billionaires, average wealth of $1.7 billion, and a cut-off of $472 million - $85 million higher than last year.
The so-called 'top end of town' just got richer, with cardboard king Anthony Pratt leading a Financial Review Rich List that is worth more than ever before.
The top 10 on the list, now in its 37th annual edition, has been revealed ahead of the full Rich List's publication on Friday in The Australian Financial Review Magazine.
Anthony Pratt has raced ahead of the Rich List pack in 2019. Alina Gozin'a
The 200 wealthiest individuals or families in Australia now control wealth totalling $341.8 billion.
That is up from $282.7 billion last year, although once the slide in property prices begins to show up on balance sheets, 2019 could prove a high water mark.
In the meantime, the 2019 Rich List is one full of records: 91 billionaires, an average wealth of $1.7 billion, and a cut-off of $472 million - a healthy $85 million higher than last year.
The Rich List is as heavy on property moguls as ever - there are 63 of them - but possibly inoculating the list against a property slump are a record number of technologists.
This band of 14 disruptors are led by Atlassian co-founders Scott Farquhar and Mike Cannon-Brookes, with the doubling of its NASDAQ-listed shares over the years propelling them into the top 10 for the first time.
Meanwhile, this is Mr Pratt’s third consecutive year at the top.
Nearly half of his box-making and recycling empire is now based in the United States, so when President Donald Trump slashed the corporate tax rate and granted instant write-offs for investment, Pratt's overall pre-tax earnings grew 15 per cent to $1.26 billion.
This put his family's valuation more than $1.5 billion clear of former list leaders Gina Rinehart (No. 2, $13.81 billion)) and Harry Triguboff (No. 3, $13.54 billion).
Pratt's valuation was also fuelled by stronger price-to-earnings multiples for listed comparables like Amcor and Sonoco – not that his US-based Pratt Industries, or Australian cousin Visy, will ever be listed or sold while he has a say in it.
With their fortunes largely tied to the iron ore price, Gina Rinehart and Andrew Forrest (No.6, $7.99 billion) had a solid year as that benchmark soared to $US100 a tonne.
Ms Rinehart continued to grow the operations of her Hancock Prospecting, forming a joint venture with Rio Tinto to open the Baby Hope mine at the Hope Downs site, and gaining control of iron ore junior Atlas Iron as well as Canadian metallurgical coal opportunity Riversdale Resources.
Meanwhile, Meriton founder Harry Triguboff has had to cut his apartment prices about 20 per cent over the past year, but does not see the downturn as an existential threat to his wealth.
It's a "temporary problem", he told The Australian Financial Review Magazine.
"I would be worried if I had to drop my rents, but that has not happened yet," he says.
A property mogul far less well-known than Mr Triguboff, Hui Wing Mau, has joined the elite club of double-digit billionaires after a higher share price for his Hong Kong-listed Shimao Property Holdings and slightly stronger Hong Kong dollar increased his valuation to $10.39 billion, and fourth on the list.
Shimao reported 213 projects across 84 cities in China, with end value of $185 billion, in 2018. Hui holds Australian citizenship after studying for an MBA at the University of South Australia in the early 1990s.
Find out who are Australia's richest people in the Financial Review Rich List 2019, out on Friday.
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