One of Australia’s best-known businessmen Clive Palmer is back near the top of the country’s rich list.

Mr Palmer has not made Forbes‘ list of the 50 richest Australians for five years, but he has been included at 20th position in the 2019 with a net worth of $1.8 billion.

It is his first appearance on the list as a billionaire.

Mr Palmer’s recent boost in finances comes after Chinese company Citic was ordered to pay more than $200 million in royalties to Mr Palmer’s company Mineralogy.

Citic had paid Mr Palmer $579.6 million in 2006 as part of a takeover agreement of the Sino Iron project in the Pilbara, but Citic refused to pay the second royalty until it was ordered to do so by the Supreme Court.

The Australia Rich List for 2019 was just released. https://t.co/G3mtWmaSaM pic.twitter.com/B93iqCS1Hi

— Forbes Asia (@ForbesAsia) January 16, 2019

His return to the list also comes three years after his Queensland Nickel refinery in Townsville collapsed with $300 million in debts, leaving more than 800 people out of work.

In light of his recent windfall, Mr Palmer is attempting a return to the political scene.

Meanwhile, mining mogul Gina Rinehart remained on top of the Australian list with a net worth, according to Forbes, of $14.8 billion.

It is the seventh time in the past eight years that Forbes has calculated her net worth as being over $10 billion and she is well clear at the top of the pile.

Australia’s wealthiest person Gina Rinehart is believed to be worth $14.8 billion. Photo: Getty

She is almost $6 billion wealthier than Meriton owner Harry Triguboff, with Visy boss Anthony Pratt third on the list at $6.8 billion.

The release of the Forbes list appears to have coincided with Visy securing a deal to supply Amazon with boxes.

Mr Pratt shared a video of himself dancing on Twitter to celebrate a new customer just a day after saying he was in Seattle to meet with the online shopping company.

https://twitter.com/anthonyjpratt2/status/1085599580710785024

Frank Lowy, who sold shopping centre empire Westfield in June, was fourth on the list with $6.5 billion, while the youngest members of the rich list rounded out the top five.

Atlassian co-founders Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar, both 39 years old, are worth a reported $6.4 billion thanks to their stakes in the collaboration software firm, which counts NASA, Tesla and SpaceX among its customers.

–ABC