Chinese make huge gains on Forbes list
- Source: Global Times
- [02:05 March 12 2010]
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By Song Shengxia
The world has a new richest man, and his claim of the throne is being seen as a sign that the world's wealthiest club, traditionally dominated by Americans and Europeans, is seeing an increasing amount of fresh blood from emerging countries.
The latest Forbes rich list came out Thursday, and while the biggest revelation was that neither Bill Gates' nor Warren Buffet's names topped the list, it also showed that the Asia-Pacific region and emerging countries are producing more tycoons than ever before.
It was a narrow win, but Mexican telecom giant Carlos Slim used his $53.5 billion net worth to slip past Gates and his $53 billion, knocking Microsoft's co-founder into second a year after he had reclaimed the top spot from Buffet. Gates had been the richest person for 14 of the last 15 years.
Also flexing its new muscle was China, which more than doubled its number of billionaires last year. The nation led the way among all Asian nations, which combined to produce 234 billionaire tycoons, up from just 130 last year.
The combined wealth of the super-rich in Asia-Pacific region more than doubled from $357 billion to $729 billion, far outpacing any other nation's collective growth.
The US still led the list with 403 billionaires, with Americans accounting for 40 percent of the super rich, but that percentage is down 5 points from last year.
Meanwhile, China placed 64 from the mainland on the list, up from 28 last year. Coming in second in Asia was India, with its billionaire count rising from 24 to 49. Hong Kong was third with 25, Japan followed with 18, then came 11 from Taiwan.
Of the 97 names that made their debut on the list, 62 are from Asia, a nine-fold increase from last year when only seven new faces came from Asia.
The top two richest from the Asia-Pacific region, Mukesh Ambani and Lakshmi Mittal, are from India. They were said to be worth $29 billion and $28.7 billion, respectively, ranking 4th and 5th on the global list.
Forbes' Shanghai bureau chief, Russell Flannery, told the Global Times that the result shows the remarkable changes taking place in the global economic landscape.
"Those on the list raked in a lot of fortune thanks to the strong performance of the stock market in the Asia Pacific region over the past year," he said.
The average net worth of the world's billionaires is now $3.5 billion, up $500 million from last year, and the total number of billionaires on this year's list rose from 793 to 1,011.
