The publication this week of Australia’s leading annual executive “rich list”, in BRW business magazine, is a sign of the times, showing 71 resources executives on the list of 200 – compared with just 39 last year.
Another sign of the times – though we’re not quite sure what it says, except, perhaps that you really can keep reinventing yourself Down Under: Alan Bond, the former bankrupt and convicted fraudster, and formerly one of Australia’ most successful and colourful business leaders, has made a stunning comeback, rejoining the annual rich list after 19 years.
Further reinforcing the notion of Australia as a land of unbounded opportunity, one Australian newspaper reported on the elevation of Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest, the 46-year-old mining tycoon, to first place on the BRW rich list with the headline: “Former jackaroo now worth $10 billion”
A special 220-page booklet published to mark the 25th year of BRW’s annual list examines the trends that have pushed the total wealth of Australia’s super rich beyond A$170bn ($163bn). Top of the list is Forrest, founder and chief executive of Fortescue Metals Group, thanks to his A$8.4bn shareholding in the company. As the Herald Sun notes, three weeks ago Forrest, 46, was named Australia’s richest man in Forbes Magazine’s annual billionaires’ list and was ranked 146th in the world.
Yet, just four years ago, Forrest’s shares were worth just A$36m.
Rupert Murdoch is second on the list, with A$7.9bn worth of News Corp shares. Even though he lives in the US, Murdoch is included because News is still listed on the Australian Stock Exchange.
The lists themselves make for fascinating reading, says Stephen Mayne, in a commentary on the news and gossip website Crikey.com. But he also recommends the pieces looking at wealth and sexism, “which seems appallingly entrenched”.
Letting a few old billionaire warriors tell their own stories was also a good initiative, says Mayne, and you can’t go past the observations of billionaire property developer Harry “Slap ‘em up” Triguboff, chairman and managing director of Meriton Apartments – often criticised for its Treblinka-esque architecture – who was quoted as follows:
“I don’t take shit from anyone so I will have my critics. But then again, I have plenty of friends, too. I cause two things: critics and friends. You can have neither or both. You can’t have one without the other. When I first started building, no-one had money so did they want me to be Michelangelo when people couldn’t afford to buy a hut?”
“Go Harry!”, says Mayne, before turning his sights on Alan Bond’s return and the “swashbuckling Perth entrepreneur” Andrew Forrest.
The return of Bond, 19 years after his last appearance on the list in 1989 and eight years after being released from prison, sees him gain a ranking of 157 and a fortune of A$265m built on his overseas mining interests. Bond, who was declared bankrupt in 1992, now holds stakes in Madagascar Oil and Lesotho Diamond Corporation, which are at various stages of development, reports The Australian.
BRW said it had undertaken an extensive investigation into Bond’s fortune, and its valuation of him was the minimum.
Bond went from signwriter and real estate developer to corporate high-flier before he was convicted in 1997 of the then biggest corporate fraud in Australia’s history – stripping A $1.2bn from Bell Resources. He spent just over three years in jail before his release in 2000.
In an interview with British society magazine Tatler about two years ago, Bond said the cash would roll in once his African investments hit paydirt. “I never lost faith in my ability to climb the mountain again,” Bond said then. But, as The Australian reminds us, “money can’t buy respect”.
The bank account may be overflowing and the mansions in beachside Perth and trendy London may be mere beds to rest his weary head, but not even $265m can buy Alan Bond the one thing he craves most: his lost reputation.
Among other interesting trends, the BRW list now features eight billionaires. But the collective wealth of the 200 executives is A$44bn, down A$2.6bn from last year. Also, there are only three women on the list of 200 executives, the highest being Computershare executive director Penelope Maclagan at No 37.
Below is BRW’s Top 10. But for those who want a more comprehensive view of the top income ranks in Australia, Crikey’s Stephen Mayne has put together his own “ultimate rich list” available at his commentary site, The Mayne Report.
BRW’s Top 10 (all figures in Australian dollars):
1. Andrew Forrest, Fortescue Metals Group, $8.358 billion
2. Rupert Murdoch, News Corporation, $7.869 billion
3. James Packer, Crown and Consolidated Media Holdings, $3.362 billion
4. Frank Lowy, Westfield Group, $2.805 billion
5. Alan Wilson, Reece Australia, $1.483 billion
6. Kerr Neilson, Platinum Asset Management, $1.346 billion
7. Gerry Harvey, Harvey Norman, $1.246 billion
8. John Grill, WorleyParsons, $1.105 billion
9. Kerry Stokes, Seven Network, $990 million
10. Terry Peabody, Transpacific Industries, $749 million