Q+A: How Australia’s richest people really make - and keep - their money
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Welcome to Fear and Greed Q&A, where we ask and answer questions about business, investing, economics, politics, and more. I'm Michael Thompson, and good morning, Sean Aylmer. Good morning, Michael. Sean, today we're going to talk about one of our favorite topics, wealth. And in particular, not just wealth, but the richest of the rich, because the AFR rich list has been announced this morning, and there's a lot of familiar names in the top 10, really across the broader list. But I wanted to get your take on this because you have a pretty unique insight into this. You edited BRW, which was the original home of the rich list. And so you have not just seen the lists evolve over years, but you used to have to pick up the phone and call these people and ask them about their wealth, which feels like it would be a very uncomfortable conversation.
What amazed me was how many of them wanted us to get it right. Because if we got it wrong, if we overstated it, for example, the tax office might come a calling. And certainly the rich lists are used by the ATO to check on people's incomes. At least they were. I presume that's still the case. And if you understated it, no one likes being told they're not quite as rich as others. I mean, that's not always the case. I remember one very well-known business leader. I won't mention his name. He got his lawyer to talk to me. I can't remember the number.
What recent insights does the AFR Rich List reveal about Australian wealth?
It might have been $500 million. And the lawyer, I went through it, explained it all. And the lawyer, there's a silence after I said, so that's what we've got him at, $520 million. There's this moment of silence. And he goes, hmm, I think that's probably all you need to know. I wonder how much more. And then, of course, others who fill off the rich list would give you a call and say, hey, why aren't I on the rich list? And you say, well, you didn't make it this year. And suddenly you could uncover all sorts of things and assets that they had that you never knew before.
The cutoff to get into the top 10 this year is very, very high overall. I mean, Gina Reinhart coming in at number one with $39 billion. Harry Triggerboff from Meritan, $32.3 billion. Anthony Pratt and family, $25.2 billion. All the way down to – all the way down, I say, but to number 10, the Verocci family, which, of course, the founders of Chemist Warehouse, $12.8 billion. Anything less than that and you're outside of the top 10 richest in Australia, which is quite incredible, isn't it?
Anything outside $834 million and you're outside the top 200. That's incredible, just how many billionaires we have. And the fact that that $834 million cutoff mark is three or four times higher than it was previously. 13 years ago when I did it, or maybe no, actually it's a bit longer than that. It's probably 15 or 16 years ago that I did it.
How has the compilation of the Rich List evolved over time?
So to have the growth in wealth three or four times the cutoff mark in that period is amazing. What's interesting, preponderance of property people. always has been and they're almost the only sector that consistently sits at that top level with the exception of two iron ore people and that's Jenna Reinhart and Andrew Forrest used to be the Forrest family now it's Angela and Nicola outside them it's mostly property people who have this consistency of appearing in the list and I mean Harry Triggerboff is the second person on the list more recent times we've had the tech crowd so Canva this time and the Atlassian guys have fallen off the top 20 but they're not top 10 so the tech guys have done well at other points media did well so the Murdochs the Packers in the early days they were among the kingpins of
Kerry Stokes, which isn't a media company. I mean, he's built his empire around media, but more in mining. I think he's number 11 this year. He is another media baron who's been on there. But really, the consistent sector, I suggest if you want to be on the rich list, right, is property in Australia.
That top 10, their combined wealth, $215.9 billion, which is, it sounds like a lot, but then you also compare it to, say, the rich list in the United States and really one person.
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