Georgina Hope Rinehart (née Hancock, born 9 February 1954) is an Australian billionaire mining magnate and businesswoman. Rinehart is the Executive Chairman of Hancock Prospecting, a privately owned mineral exploration and extraction company founded by her father, Lang Hancock.
Rinehart was born in Perth, Western Australia, and spent her early years in the Pilbara region. She boarded at St Hilda's Anglican School for Girls and then briefly studied at the University of Sydney, dropping out to work with her father at Hancock Prospecting. She was Lang Hancock's only child, and when he died in 1992 she succeeded him as executive chairman. She turned a company with severe financial difficulties into the largest private company in Australia and one of the largest mining houses in the world.
When Rinehart took over Hancock Prospecting, its total wealth was estimated at 75 million, which did not account for group liabilities and contingent liabilities of around 100 million. She oversaw an expansion of the company over the following decade, and due to the iron ore boom of the early 2000s became a nominal billionaire in 2006. In the 2010s, Rinehart began to expand her holdings into areas outside the mining industry. She made sizeable investments in Ten Network Holdings and Fairfax Media (although she sold her interest in the latter in 2015), and also expanded into agriculture, buying several cattle stations, divesting them within a decade.
Rinehart is Australia's richest person. Her wealth reached around 29 billion in 2012, at which point she overtook Christy Walton as the world's richest woman and was included on the Forbes list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women. Rinehart's net worth dropped significantly over the following few years due to a slowdown in the Australian mining sector. Forbes estimated her net worth in 2019 at 14.8 billion as published in the list of Australia's 50 richest people. However, her wealth was rebuilt again during 2020 due to increased demand for Australian iron ore, so that by May 2023, her net worth as published in the 2023 Financial Review Rich List was estimated in excess of 37 billion; while in March 2021, The Australian Business Review stated her wealth equalled 36.28 billion. Forbes considered Rinehart one of the world's ten richest women. Rinehart was Australia's wealthiest person from 2011 to 2015, according to both Forbes and The Australian Financial Review; and again every year since 2020, according to The Australian Business Review and The Australian Financial Review.
Early life and family
Rinehart was born on 9 February 1954 at St John of God Subiaco Hospital in Perth, Western Australia. She is the only child of Hope Margaret Nicholas and Lang Hancock. Until age four, Rinehart lived with her parents at Nunyerry, north of Wittenoom. Her family then moved to Mulga Downs station in the Pilbara. Later Rinehart boarded at St Hilda's Anglican School for Girls in Perth. She briefly studied economics at the University of Sydney, before dropping out and working for her father, gaining an extensive knowledge of the Pilbara iron-ore industry. Rinehart rebuilt the HPPL company to become one of the most successful private companies in Australia's history.
In 1973, at age 19, Rinehart met Englishman Greg Milton while both were working in Wittenoom. At this time Milton changed his surname to an earlier family name Hayward. Their children John Langley and Bianca Hope were born in 1976 and 1977 respectively. The couple separated in 1979 and divorced in 1981. In 1983, she married corporate lawyer and Arco executive, Frank Rinehart, in Las Vegas. They had two children, Hope and Ginia, born in 1986 and 1987 respectively. Frank Rinehart received a scholarship to Harvard for his services in the then US Army Air Corps. He was top of Harvard College, and then top of Harvard Law School, while also studying engineering, and holding a full-time and two part time jobs. Frank Rinehart died in 1990.
Rinehart and her step-mother, Rose Porteous, were involved in a legal fight from 1992 over Hancock's death and bankrupt estate. The ordeal ultimately took 14 years to settle. With HPPL retaining the mining tenements, Mrs Porteous had endeavored to allege did not belong to the company.
In 1999, the Western Australian state government approved a proposal to name a mountain range in honour of her family. Hancock Range is situated about north-west of the town of Newman at and commemorates the family's contribution to the establishment of the pastoral and mining industry in the Pilbara region.
