Ontario business tycoon worth almost $29B is one of world's 100 richest people

A Toronto investment firm tycoon who owns a local spa and restaurant has reclaimed the honour of being ranked among one of the top 100 wealthiest people in the world.

Sherry Brydson has been moving up and down the rankings in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, and recently leapt from just outside the list's top 100 rankings, moving from 101st place up to 98th.

Currently the second-wealthiest Canadian overall and richest Canadian woman as of March 2025, according to Bloomberg, Brydson has climbed from the 107th position in 2024, amassing a wealth of $20.2 billion USD/$28.875 billion CAD.

That's enough money to buy a nuclear-powered Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier and still have around $7 billion USD left over as spending money.

Brydson has accumulated this fortune thanks to her position as the largest shareholder in investment firm Woodbridge, controlling a 23 per cent stake in the major firm run by Canada's wealthiest family — the Thomsons.

Brydson, who is the granddaughter of the late media tycoon Roy Thomson, 1st Baron Thomson of Fleet, has outpaced the wealth of other Thomson family members to become the top-grossing member of Canada's most prosperous family.

In January 2023, Sherry Brydson temporarily surpassed Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao as the richest Canadian on the Index, though she now sits 57 spots behind the controversial crypto tycoon on the global ranking, with a commanding hold on the title of Canada's wealthiest woman and second-richest person.

Aside from her shares in Woodbridge, Brydson has also dabbled in other ventures. She is the owner of the Elmwood Spa on Elm Street in downtown Toronto, which is esteemed as the city's top-rated spa according to blogTO readers.

She is also the owner of the adjacent Bangkok Garden restaurant, which was one of the city's first Thai eateries when it opened in 1982.

While she has kept an incredibly low profile outside of her business ventures, Brydson has drawn public attention in the past, most notably in an incident where she and dozens of other activists chained themselves inside the House of Commons as part of the historic 1970 Abortion Caravan, bringing Parliamentary proceedings to a halt.

Her actions to protest Canada's strict abortion laws were a factor in the Supreme Court striking down previous legislation in 1988.