Former ABC broadcaster Margaret Throsby is facing a long road to recovery after breaking several bones and suffering extensive head injuries in an e-bike collision with two teenagers riding a “fat bike” along a popular coastal walking track in the Illawarra region.

The 84-year-old remained in hospital on Thursday, almost one week after she was struck by the rider and passenger while on her regular morning walk in Bulli. She was thrown to the path after colliding with the e-bike, breaking her hip and thumb and bleeding extensively from her head. Doctors suspect she had broken another bone in her hand, which will be confirmed by x-rays this week.

‘She’s in a lot of pain’: ABC legend Margaret Throsby confronts new injuries after e-bike collision

The Gap Between the Rich and the Very, Very Rich Is Getting Wider

The 0.1% holds about 15% of the nation’s total wealth, with average household wealth of over $200 million each

The ultrawealthy aren’t just pulling away from average Americans. Buoyed by a stock-market boom that has added trillions of dollars to their net worth, the extremely rich are even pulling away from other rich Americans.

The top 0.1% wealthiest Americans have seen their total wealth more than double since the end of 2019, according to new data from the Federal Reserve. The year the pandemic started was when the ultrawealthy began to pull away from other rich groups, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Fed data.

In dollar terms, the very richest Americans have gained a total of $14.5 trillion in wealth over that period, with most of that—about $10 trillion—coming from gains in stocks and mutual funds, according to the Fed data, which runs through the end of June.

Advertisement

The 0.1% now control about $28 trillion, or about 15% of the nation’s total wealth, which amounts to nearly $186 trillion. The average wealth for a household in this group is more than $200 million. 

As of 2022, the minimum for the top 0.1% was $45.8 million, according to the most detailed data available from the Fed. With wealth among the group up by roughly 50% since then, that threshold is much higher now.

The people who fall into this group aren’t usually traditional salaried workers. Rather, they are much more likely to be the owner of a bunch of car dealerships or an heir living off investment income.

The ultrawealthy’s recent gains from the stock market dwarf the total wealth of the bottom 50% of all Americans, which is about $4 trillion. That bottom group has actually seen their wealth rise more than any other group on a percentage basis, thanks to a combination of rising home values and pandemic-era government relief that swelled bank accounts and helped pay down debt. Nevertheless, the bottom half’s share of total wealth, at an average of about $63,000 a household, comes to just 2.3% of the nation’s total wealth. The average household in the top 0.1% holds over 3,000 times as much wealth as a bottom-half household does. 

In the top 0.1% by wealth, 37% earn most of their income from businesses, and 26% derive it from capital gains, according to an analysis of Fed data from economics professors Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick for their recent book “The Everywhere Millionaire.” Only 10% derived most of their income from wages and salaries.

Advertisement

The biggest factor in this phenomenon is that wealthy people simply own a lot of stocks. In the year ended June 30, when the S&P 500 gained 21%, the top 0.1% received nearly $4 trillion of new wealth from the market.

The roughly 137,000 households who make up the nation’s top 0.1% had already become richer in comparison to everyone else in recent decades, thanks to higher incomes and lower tax rates. Now the stock-market boom, driven by strong corporate earnings and highflying tech stocks, is powering their wealth even further.

By comparison, the rest of the top 10% of richest Americans gained $38.2 trillion in wealth over the same period, but it was split among nearly a hundred times as many households.

Americans more broadly have become richer over time, as rising wages for college-educated workers, entrepreneurship and the stock market have lifted wealth for millions of Americans. The housing market has also increased the wealth of Americans who own homes.

Advertisement

SCROLL TO CONTINUE WITH CONTENT

Yet many others have been locked out of prosperity, and entrenched inflation is pressuring even those with six-figure salaries. Growing wealth at the very top has become a political flashpoint, helping fuel the rise of Democratic socialist politicians such as New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Wealth is measured as a household’s assets, like stocks and home equity, minus their liabilities, like mortgages and credit-card debt.

“The stock market’s ripping, and so if you’re in the stock market more, it has been really great,” said Zwick.

Some wealthy people borrow against their booming stock portfolios to fund their lifestyle. But even investors who keep their money in the market often spend more when stocks go up, because they feel good about their personal finances, a phenomenon economists call “the wealth effect.”

Binetter: The overseas chase for Nudie Juice family’s millions allegedly owed to the tax office

"The top 0.1% wealthiest Americans have seen their total wealth more than double since the end of 2019... The 0.1% now control about $28 trillion, or about 15% of the nation’s total wealth, which amounts to nearly $186 trillion."
By Rachel Louise Ensign & Justin Lahart.

The Gap Between the Rich and the Very, Very Rich Is Getting Wider

The overseas chase for Nudie Juice family’s millions allegedly owed to the tax office

Nine years after apparently reaching a deal with the ATO, a wealthy Sydney family is being pursued by a liquidator over millions of dollars in funds he believes were hidden abroad. 

Almost nine years after agreeing to settle a war with the tax office, the Binetter family that made its fortune from Nudie Juice is being pursued overseas by an Adelaide liquidator over his suspicions cash has been hidden.

Two of the Binetter brothers, Michael and Andrew, have blocked attempts by the liquidator seeking to examine them. Michael has attempted to stay silent to avoid self-incrimination 250 times – pleading the fifth amendment to a United States component of the litigation.

Andrew had surgery to treat a brain tumour. 

Liquidator John Sheahan says there are still millions of dollars unaccounted for. The Binetters say Mr Sheahan should give up the chase. 

Mr Sheahan is now pursuing Andrew and Michael, the sons of Erwin Binetter, alleging they transferred millions offshore in the lead-up to a deal struck between the Binetters and the Australian Taxation Office. He estimates $150m is at stake.

Erwin and Emil Binetter, also brothers, were born in 1920s Slovakia and migrated to Australia after World War II, fleeing persecution that killed many members of their Jewish family.

They set up a series of successful companies in Australia, including the well-known Nudie Juice operation which was bought in 2015 by Philippines-based Monde Nissin Corporation for about $82m. The proceeds of the sale of Nudie were taken by liquidators. Why? Because the Binetter family for all its success drew upon a convoluted back-to-back loan scheme. 

These loans, it was alleged by the ATO, were not real lending. Instead, the ATO claimed interest was minimal or lacking entirely, and Israeli banks took on a fee for service. The Binetter companies could allegedly claim the interest paid on the loans as a tax deduction, thereby slashing their own Australian tax bills. 

Former Nudie Juice boss Andrew Binetter, far right. Image: Flickr

By 2015, the ATO sued the Binetters, Andrew and Michael among them, alleging they ran a tax-avoidance scheme. In 2018 the family agreed to settle for $45m.

A string of Binetter family companies was placed into liquidation, one of several manoeuvres required under the terms of its “global settlement” with the ATO. The Binetters also had to assist with suing the banks that enabled the back-to-back loan arrangements, ultimately extracting $137m. 

Mr Sheahan was appointed liquidator of the Binetter companies. In 2021, he sued. Mr Sheahan claimed the late Emil and Gerda Binetter, son Gary, and their other children had sent $23m to Lichtenstein in 2013. And that in 2014, Erwin’s children, Michael and Andrew, left Australia for the United States. 

Mr Sheahan has also sued Bank of Queensland and extracted a settlement over the role of its private-client business in the scheme. He claimed BOQ had assisted the family, and failed to carry out its know-your-customer controls. 

But Mr Sheahan expects more. 

He told The Australian legal action in the US and Australia is designed to realise nearly $150m “still owed” to the ATO. Over the years, Mr Sheahan has extracted $210m from Binetter companies.

He said the tax office was “regularly provided with detailed reports on those investigations and continues to support my efforts in that regard”. 

“I note that those investigations in the United States have been opposed by the Binetters and observe that at every step their applications have been unsuccessful in the American courts,” Mr Sheahan said. 

Nudie Juice operation was bought in 2015 by Philippines-based Monde Nissin Corporation.

“If the Binetters were genuinely concerned about ensuring no further diminution of any companies’ resources, I invite them to start co-operating with me in those investigations rather than seeking to obstruct and delay me.”

Two years ago, the Federal Court found a key company associated with the Binetters had fraudulently won a fight with the ATO almost 12 years earlier, leaving it with a $3.65m bill. 

Justice Melissa Perry found Andrew Binetter “gave patently false evidence” in the trial and later appeal. 

The pursuit has also split the family. A third brother, Ron Binetter, and wife Deborah Huber gave evidence against Michael Binetter in one case. (Ron was not one of the brothers targeted by the ATO).

Ron was cut out of his mother’s will. They gave evidence that Michael had asked Ms Huber to translate the Hebrew in a meeting they had in Israel, where the alleged back-to-back loan scheme was discussed. 

The Binetter family has largely left Australia but cannot escape the tax fight.

Andrew Binetter, who ran Nudie, is in Puerto Rico. His brother, Michael, is in New York. 

Mr Sheahan said it was necessary to crack open the peace deal and reopen the case against the Binetter brothers because of new evidence showing they had used foreign companies to hide assets and avoid tax. 

But the tactics used by Mr Sheahan in his US pursuit have angered the Binetter family, who claim he reneged on the critical peace deal inked with the ATO in 2014. They claim the liquidator lodged papers to tear up the deal on the final day covered by the deed, plunging the Binetters back into years of tax disputes.

Andrew Binetter has also been dealing with deteriorating health, and sources close to the family say he has undergone surgery and treatment for his brain tumour. 

A spokeswoman for the Binetters said: “It is eight years since a comprehensive settlement was reached with the knowledge and participation of the Australian Taxation Office. 

“Now, we have only questions – why file new proceedings on the last day of the limitation period? Why delay serving those proceedings for five more months? Why lodge new, broad discovery motions in the US?”

She questioned whether the ATO was “comfortable with the millions in liquidator fees and disbursements plus extensive legal costs being incurred each year?”

“Ultimately, who are these actions serving?” she asked. 

Mr Sheahan served subpoenas on Michael Binetter, Andrew Binetter and his wife Samantha Kelliher. But Michael and Andrew have resisted Mr Sheahan’s campaign by trying to have the examinations set aside.

Both sides have spent millions on legal fees; Mr Sheahan has newly changed his legal team to Ashurst. 

In Australia, the Federal Court has ordered companies related to the liquidation to pay $720,000 as security for Andrew Binetter and Samantha Kelliher’s costs.

A federal bankruptcy court judge in New York found Michael Binetter was not entitled to make his sweeping claims against self incrimination, setting the stage for a new round of examinations. 

Since relocating to the US, Andrew Binetter has established a pre-cooked dining operation: Nate’s Fine Foods.

Mr Sheahan told a federal court in California how he thought Nate’s had “relevant ties to the Binetters’ tax scheme”.

Mr Sheahan said the resources being used on the Binetter matter were “not only reasonable, commercial and in the best interests of creditors but is, in fact, imperative to maximising returns in the administrations”.

“To date, my administration of this group has generated in excess of $200m for creditors, nearly all of which was recovered from legal proceedings,” he said.

More CoverageMORE ON THIS STORY

Fewer companies playing a zero-sum game on tax

By MATTHEW CRANSTON 

Ex-tax boss roped into KPMG scandal over haven claim

By TANSY HARCOURT

‘A bit rude’: Tax boss shuts down questions about transparency

By DAVID ROSS

DAVID ROSSJOURNALIST

David Ross is a Sydney-based journalist at The Australian. He previously worked at the European Parliament and as a freelance journalist, writing for many publications including Myanmar Business Today where he was an Australian correspondent. He has a Masters in Journalism from The University of Melbourne.

Putin Regime: Nearly 200 People Under Observation After Irkutsk Lab Worker Dies From Plague

The Unbearable Lightness of Being. I think somebody has already written that. I did! But I was wrong about the title then. That title was supposed to belong to the novel I'm writing right now.

 - Milan Kundera

 UNWANTED MEMORIES OF AGA'S GRAVE

Russia Hides Potential Pneumonic Plague Outbreak After Fatal Lab Breach

The head of neighboring Buryatia, Alexey Tsydenov, initially said Shipilova had died from plague, only to later soften his statement to say she “may have died from plague.”

This strain might have been responsible for Black Death in 14th century which killed half of Europe.

Putin regime accused of Russian black plague cover-up after scientist dies amid possible spread

Woman Dies of Suspected Plague Infection, Nearly 200 People Who Had Contact with Her Placed Under Medical Observation

Daria Shipilova, a lab technician in her late 20s, died of a suspected pneumonic plague infection in Russia on Oct. 2

• Daria Shipilova, a lab technician in her late 20s, died of a suspected pneumonic plague infection in Russia on Oct. 2
• Nearly 200 people who had contact with the woman, who worked at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute in Siberia, were placed under medical observation
• Russian authorities said anti-epidemic measures are underway
• 
  

A woman has died of a suspected plague infection in Russia — and nearly 200 people who had contact with her were placed under medical observation.

The deceased woman was identified as Daria Shipilova, a lab technician in her late 20s who was employed at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute in Siberia, according to The Moscow Times, regional Russian news outlet People of Baikal and 1news.az.

Pneumonic plague can infect the lungs and can be transmitted from person to person via respiratory droplets. Pneumonic plague is considered fatal unless treated early, per WHO.

Nearly 200 People Under Observation After Irkutsk Lab Worker Dies From Plague

Kirill Zykov / Moskva News Agency

Health authorities in Siberia’s Irkutsk region have placed nearly 200 people under medical observation after a laboratory worker died from plague, according to media reports and a statement by a regional leader Friday.

Alexei Tsydenov, head of the neighboring republic of Buryatia, confirmed that the woman had died from an unspecified form of plague. Irkutsk officials had previously described the illness only as a “particularly dangerous infection.”

Citing information from Russia’s consumer safety watchdog Rospotrebnadzor and Buryatia’s government, Tsydenov said the woman had not visited his republic and that her infection was unrelated to the region.

“There are no plague outbreaks in the republic, including in areas bordering Mongolia,” he wrote on social media.

The woman was identified as Daria Sh., a 27- or 28-year-old employee of the Irkutsk anti-plague institute, by the exiled news outlet Lyudi Baikala (People of Baikal) and pro-Kremlin broadcaster REN TV.

She reportedly told medical staff that she had accidentally broken a test tube containing live bacteria while collecting samples for testing.

She was hospitalized Tuesday with symptoms of severe pneumonia in Shelekhov, a town near the regional capital of Irkutsk. She was placed on a ventilator and died Thursday, according to the reports.

The Shelekhov district hospital was placed under quarantine pending an assessment by a special commission.

At least 197 people who may have had contact with her were reportedly placed under medical isolation, including more than 100 in hospital wards.

Authorities canceled planned public events in Irkutsk, while law enforcement reportedly opened a criminal investigation into potential health safety violations resulting in death.

Irkutsk region Governor Igor Kobzev urged the public to remain calm after meeting with Rospotrebnadzor chief Anna Popova to coordinate emergency containment measures.

“All identified contact persons have been placed under medical observation. As of today, the contacts show no signs of illness, and their laboratory test results are negative,” Kobzev wrote on Telegram on Friday. He did not mention the reports of the laboratory worker’s death.

Media reports have described the suspected infection as pneumonic plague, which affects the lungs and can spread between humans through respiratory droplets. Tsydenov’s statement did not specify the form of plague.