By Tom Reilly
FOR average Australians trying to make ends meet, life over the past year may have been a struggle, with rising interest rates, grocery prices and utilities. But not for the country's most fabulously rich youngsters who, on the whole, have become even more fabulous this year.
The annual BRW Young Rich List was released yesterday and it is good news for tyro tycoons. The entry level to make the top 100 jumped from $15 million to $19 million from 2009, and total wealth recorded on the table is a mighty $6.3 billion, up half a billion over 12 months.
For those at the very top of the list, the past 12 months could be surmised as the year of the deal.
''The stock market is not going great, it's tough to get bank financing but most of the people on the list have been able to buck the trends and increased their wealth,'' says BRW Young Rich editor John Stensholt.
The youthful high-flyers.
Mining magnate Nathan Tinkler tops the ladder with a fortune of $610 million, up from $366 million. His surge has been attributed to the floating of his mining company Aston Resources, with his stake being worth about $400 million.
He replaces last year's No. 1, Adelaide property developer Ross Makris, who departs the list having merged his business with his father Con Makris's company.
Other high fliers can also point to business coups: third-placed Hilton Nathanson negotiated a management buyout of his Marble Bar Asset Management company, while in joint fifth are Sydney duo Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar with $314 million. That figure is up from $64 million a year ago, thanks to a deal the pair negotiated with US venture capitalists in July, selling a 16 per cent stake in their software company Atlassian for $US60 million.
But whatever the list has gained in dollars and cents, in the glamour stakes it was a net loser. Movie stars Hugh Jackman and Naomi Watts became ineligible after turning 41. While Tinkler, who also has extensive horse-racing interests, may be no Hollywood heart-throb, he has got business smarts, according to Mr Stensholt, pulling off ''two of the most brilliant deals in the last three years''.
There are plenty of others on the list with more than a passing interest in sport, including Harry Kewell ($60 million), grand prix driver Mark Webber ($31 million), Tim Cahill ($21 million) and basketballer Andrew Bogut ($25 million). There are only seven women on the list, led by Nicole Patterson at $61 million, who jointly owns insurance builder/repairer company Pattersons Insurerbuild with husband Stuart Patterson.