Thomson is 17th richest in world

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This article was published 11/03/2011 (5575 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THERE’S no need to pass the hat for the silent partner of a prospective ownership group interested in bringing a National Hockey League franchise to Winnipeg.

David Thomson, chairman of media powerhouse Thomson Reuters, and his family hold down 17th spot in Forbes magazine’s just-released annual report on billionaires around the world.

The family’s net worth is estimated at US$23 billion, about $23.7 billion in loonies. That’s up US$4 billion from a year ago, when the Thomson family ranked 20th.

“He’s in a rarified set of billionaires,” said Kerry Dolan, San Francisco-based senior editor at Forbes.

The 53-year-old Thomson is good friends and business partners with Winnipeg’s Chipman family. The partnership has reportedly submitted a proposal to the NHL to buy and relocate a team — the Phoenix Coyotes appear to be on the front burner but the Atlanta Thrashers are also rumoured to be on the radar — to Winnipeg.

The collaboration goes back to the early days of the Manitoba Moose in Winnipeg. When Mark Chipman began his research on what would ultimately become the MTS Centre, he found a potential site in the old Eaton’s building on Portage Avenue. That building was owned by Osmington Inc., a real estate company owned by the Thomsons. Rather than simply selling the building and moving on, Thomson opted to take out an ownership stake in True North Sports & Entertainment, the Chipman-run company that owns the Moose and the downtown rink.

A group of Winnipeggers, including Hartley Richardson, Sandy Riley, Derek Johannson, Bob Silver and the Pollard family, invested money in the MTS Centre, but they were all eventually bought out by the Chipmans and Thomson.

The Thomson family’s media empire was first amassed by David Thomson’s grandfather, Roy Thomson, and then grown by his late father, Ken. Despite owning the Globe and Mail newspaper, the Thomsons are fiercely private and little is written about them in the Canadian media.

Dolan was quick to note it’s not like Thomson has $23 billion in the bank. The vast majority of the family’s wealth, $18.3 billion, to be precise, is tied up in Thomson Reuters stock. Those shares kicked out dividends of $265 million last year. That’s enough to buy about one-and-a-half NHL teams at the going rate.

Last year, the Thomsons headed up Canadian Business magazine’s annual Rich 100 list of Canada’s wealthiest citizens.

To put their net worth in perspective, it’s greater than that of Galen Weston (No. 2 at $8.5 billion), the Irving family (No. 3 at $7.46 billion) and the Rogers family (No. 4 at $6.02 billion) combined. The richest family in Winnipeg, the Richardsons, ranked 13th with a net worth of $2.86 billion.

“The Thomsons could have the (gross domestic product) of a small country or a large city all by themselves,” Dolan said.

Thomson is well known for his vast collection of art — he made a sizeable donation to the Art Gallery of Ontario last year — and reportedly has no interest in wine or horse racing.

“His big passion is art,” Dolan said.

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca