Many of China’s richest people have grown poorer over the past year and the number of its US dollar billionaires has fallen for the first time in seven years, according to the Hurun Rich List, which tracks Chinese wealth.
In its annual report on China’s super-wealthy, released yesterday, Hurun said China had 251 people worth $1bn or more, down 20 from last year but still sharply up from 2006, when there were just 15. For the first time since Hurun began publishing the list in 1999, property lost pride of place as the sector that generates the most wealth.
Nearly half of the 1,000 richest people in China saw their wealth shrink in the past year, 37 of them by more than 50 per cent.