Richest People
Top 10 Richest People In Canada (2024)
Canada is one of the countries in the world known for economic and political stability. The country has produced a total of 67 billionaires, making it the eighth country with the highest billionaires in the world. In this article, we compiled a list of the top 10 richest people in Canada.
While the majority of today’s billionaires are younger than those of the past, several heritage family institutions still control a significant portion of the nation’s wealth. But who are these billionaire family empires, exactly? The 10 richest men listed below are important to remember.
Key Details
- David Thomson is the richest man in Canada.
- Changpeng Zhao is the richest crypto billionaire in Canada
- There are over 50 Billionaires in Canada
Top 10 Richest People In Canada
The table below contains the names and net worth of the top 10 richest people in Canada in 2024.
Rank | Name | Networth | Source |
1 | David Thomson | $67 Billion | Thomson Corporation |
2 | Changpeng Zhao | $33 Billion | Binance |
3 | David Cheriton | $14 Billion | |
4 | Jim Pattison | $9.1 Billion | Jim Pattison Group |
5 | Joseph Tsai | $8.6 Billion | Alibaba |
6 | Anthony von Mandl | $7.4 Billion | Mark Anthony |
7 | Alain Bouchard | $7.4 Billion | Alimentation Couche-Tard |
8 | Arthur Irving | $6.6 Billion | Arthur Irving Gas |
9 | Tobi Lutke | $6.5 Billion | Shopify |
10 | Chip Wilson | $5.9 Billion | LuLuMelon |
1. David Thomson
With an estimated net worth of $67 billion, David Thomson is the richest man in Canada in 2024. He became the chairman of Thomson Corporation and also inherited his father’s British title, Baron Thomson of Fleet. David Thomson is first on our list of the top 10 richest people in Canada.
Thomson started his business career as a junior associate at McLeod Young Weir in Toronto. He left the firm to enter the family business, working in several positions in companies controlled by the Thomson family.
Trying to develop a business outside the family fortune he founded Osmington Incorporated, a real estate firm that acquires and manages commercial real estate assets on behalf of institutional shareholders. Thomson is also the chairman of the Globe and Mail newspaper, Woodbridge, and Thomson Reuters.
2. Changpeng Zhao
Changpeng Zhao is the founder of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume and the second richest man in Canada in 2024. His current net worth is $33 billion.
Both of his parents were educators in China. Prior to being deported to rural areas and labelled a “pro-bourgeois genius,” Zhao’s father was a university instructor. In his adolescent years, Zhao worked a variety of service jobs, including at a McDonald’s, to support his family.
Before the establishment of Binance, he studied computer science at McGill University. After university, he worked as a developer for Bloomberg. He then became a partner at Fusion Systems. In 2013, he became Head of Development at Blockchain.
In 2015, Chanpeng Zhao started Bijie Tech, an exchange systems provider. Then in 2017, he launched Binance Holdings Inc. Binance is not publicly traded but has invested in important companies like Coinmarketcap, making it one of the largest stakeholders in the crypto world.
Eleven days after Binance’s initial coin sale, which was successful in raising $15 million, trading on the exchange started. Zhao developed Binance into the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world by trading volume in less than eight months.
In 2017, Zhao also introduced Binance Coin, a utility token that offers its owners a number of advantages, such as lower trading costs. In April 2019, Binance introduced Binance Smart Chain, a smart contract platform that competes with Ethereum.
3. David Cheriton
David Cheriton is a professor at the University of Stanford. He is one of the richest people in Canada with an estimated net worth of $14 billion. He made his fortune thanks to an early $200,000 investment in Google.
Asides his Google investment David has also founded several different companies. Some of these companies include Arista Networks, which went public in 2014; Kealia, which was sold to Sun Microsystems in 2004, and Granite Systems, which was sold to Cisco in 1996. He has invested in at least 20 businesses.
He is an authority on distributed computing and computer networking, and he has knowledge of how to spot significant market opportunities and develop the architectures required to take advantage of them.
Aside from being one of the most successful venture capitalists in recent times, Cheriton also has a reputation for a frugal lifestyle, avoiding costly cars or large houses. He was once included in a list of “cheapskate billionaires”.
4. Jim Pattison
Jim Pattison is also one of the richest people in Canada. He is an investor, philanthropist, businessman and one of the richest people in Canada in 2024 with an estimated net worth of $9.1 billion.
He is the head of the Jim Pattison Group. This empire operates in 85 countries spanning an array of industries such as supermarkets, lumber, fisheries, disposable packaging, theme parks, auto dealers and more.
Following his appointment to the Order of Canada (1987) and the Order of British Columbia (1990) as well as his receipt of the Governor General’s Commemorative Medal for Canada’s 125th Anniversary, Pattison was also inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame in December 2018.
In addition, he received the Entrepreneur of the Year – Lifetime Achievement Award (2000), the International Horatio Alger Award (U.S.A., 2004), and the Young Presidents Organization Canadian Icon Award, as well as induction into the Canadian Business Hall of Fame, and the Canadian Professional Sales Association Hall of Fame (2007)
He opened a Pontiac dealership in 1961, 25 years later, he was selling more cars than anyone else in Western Canada. He grew his business to include other companies such as Overwaitea Foods, Ripley’s Believe It Or Not!, Save-On-Foods, Guinness World Records and numerous TV and radio stations across British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba.
5. Joseph Tsai
Joseph Tsai is the co-founder and executive vice chairman of the Chinese multinational technology company, Alibaba Group. The Asian-Canadian businessman is the second-largest individual shareholder in the company only behind Jack Ma. With a net worth of $8.6 billion, he is one of the top 10 richest people in Canada in 2024.
Following the communists’ takeover of Mainland China in 1949 during the Chinese Civil War, the Tsai family fled to Taiwan as part of the Kuomintang exodus. Tsai was transported to the United States at the age of 13 to enrol at the Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, where he played football (inside linebacker) and lacrosse.
He also owns the Brooklyn Nets of the American National Basketball Association (NBA), the New York Liberty of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) and the San Diego Seals of the National Lacrosse League.
Tsai was born in Taiwan but is a naturalised citizen of Canada. He started his business journey after he met Jack Ma in 1999. He quit the $700,000-a-year job at Investor AB and offered to join Ma as one of the founding members of Alibaba. He single-handedly established Alibaba’s financial and legal structure.
6. Anthony Von Mandl
Anthony von Mandl is the founder and chief executive of the Mark Anthony Group, an alcoholic drinks producer and the maker of Mike’s Hard Lemonade. He is one of the richest people in Canada in 2024, with an estimated net worth of $7.4 billion.
He began his career in the Canadian wine business as an importer in the 70s. The wine-importing business later became the Mark Anthony Group. In 1981, he bought his first winery in the Okanagan Valley, Canada where he began producing wines as well as ciders. He has since then acquired at least six wineries in the region.
According to Bloomberg, the Vancouver-based company distributes wines, spirits and beer and has annual sales of about $4 billion.
7. Alain Bouchard
Alain Bouchard is a Canadian businessman, the founder of Alimentation Corepuche-Tard and one of the richest people in Canada in 2024. His net worth is $7.4 billion. He began his entrepreneurial career in the 70s as an independent retailer.
Bouchard founded Alimentation Couche-Tard in 1980 He served as the Chief Executive Officer of the company until 2014 and expanded it from one convenience store to more than 12,500 convenience stores around the world.
Before starting Alimentation Couche-Tard in 1980, Bouchard worked as a retailer on his own in the late 1970s. From 1980 to 2014, Bouchard served as Alimentation Couche-chief Tard’s executive officer, guiding the business as it grew from one convenience store to more than 12,500 locations worldwide.
He also served on the board of directors of Atrium Innovations and as a board member of Québecor, a Canadian media and telecommunication company, from 1997 to 2009. Alain Bouchard is seventh on our list of the top 10 richest people in Canada.
8. Arthur Irving
Arthur Lee Irving was a Canadian billionaire businessman, the second son of industrialist K. C. Irving of the Irving family. Irving served as the president of Irving Oil, of which he later became the sole owner through the Arthur Irving Family Trust. By the time of his death, his net worth was estimated between US$6.4 billion and US$9.8 billion, making him one of the richest people in Canada in 2024.
Irving was also a longtime board member of Ducks Unlimited Canada. Throughout his lifetime, Irving received multiple honours and awards, including the Order of New Brunswick as well as the Order of Canada. He also received an honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of New Brunswick.
9. Tobi Lutke
With an estimated net worth of $6.5 billion, Tobi Lutke is one of the richest people in Canada in 2024. The 43-year-old entrepreneur is the founder of C0-founder of Shopify, an e-commerce company based in Canada.
Lutke began his entrepreneurial journey by co-founding Snowdevil, an online snowboard shop in 2004 with his partners, Daniel Weinand and Scott Lake. Soon they shifted their focus from snowboards to e-commerce and launched Shopify in 2006.
Shopify is presently used by more than 500,000 merchants to sell their goods and services online. Tobi presently owns 7% of the company, which went public in 2015.
10. Chip Wilson
Chip Wilson is an American-born Canadian businessman, investor, and philanthropist who has founded several retail apparel companies, most notably the yoga-inspired athletic apparel company Lululemon Athletica Inc. With a net worth of $5.9 billion, Wilson is one of the richest people in Canada in 2024.
Wilson is widely regarded as the pioneering figure of the athleisure phenomenon. The trend has spread into North American and other continents since its emergence in 2014.
Top 10 Richest People In Canada
Here is a list of the names and net worth of the top 10 richest people in Canada in 2023.
- David Thomson – $66 Billion
- Changpeng Zhao- $33 billion
- David Cheriton – $14 Billion
- Jim Pattison – $9.1 Billion
- Joseph Tsai – $8.6 Billion
- Anthony von Mandl – $7.4 Billion
- Alain Bouchard – $7.4 Billion
- Arthur Lee Irving – $6.6 Billion
- Tobi Lutke – $6.5 Billion
- Chip Wilson – $5.9 Billion