coral gold challenge maybe??? lolRob McEwen, 53, Toronto
Goldcorp Inc.
Net worth: $273 million
Even fortune tellers clam up when it comes to the future price of gold, but McEwen has no bones about making predictions. “We expect the gold price to be higher....The time to own gold is now,” Goldcorp’s chairman and CEO wrote in a recent message to shareholders.
McEwen has turned the mining industry on its head a couple of ways. While his competitors hedged their bets that the price of gold would fall, Goldcorp eschewed the tactic. As a result, the company has profited wildly from the rush to gold over the past couple of years. In fact, McEwen is holding about seven tonnes of the stuff, banking that the price is set to rise. By comparison, the Bank of Canada, which has been selling off its reserves, holds 6.2 tonnes.
The other smart thing McEwen did was to enlist the expertise of world geologists through the Internet in 2000. In the so-called Goldcorp Challenge, he offered up all the data about the company’s Red Lake, Ont., mine, and promised an award to whoever directed him to the right place to dig. More than 1,400 scientists responded—and the winning team hailed from Australia. The bold gamble paid off. In 1996, Red Lake produced 53,000 ounces. In the first nine months of 2003, it harvested 391,098 ounces.
Unlike most executives in the industry, McEwen isn’t actually a miner. He was an investment banker who caught the gold bug and bought the underperforming Red Lake mine in the late 1980s. As it stands, McEwen didn’t quite make the cut-off for this year’s rich list. What does the future hold? Well, if gold tops US$800 per ounce again, like it did in 1980, he could well be a billionaire. But this is gold we’re talking about, and McEwen’s net worth could just as easily crumble if prices tank. Only time will tell.