Fewer super rich individuals in China as fortunes shrink amid raging trade war, slowing economy, Hurun list shows
- Although 1,819 mainland individuals made it to the Hurun Rich List, 40 per cent of the people on the list two years ago failed to make the cut this year
- First time the number of wealthy individuals has fallen for two consecutive years because of a slowing economy
The ranks of wealthy individuals in China fell for a second consecutive year, with many of the mainland’s manufacturing tycoons falling behind in the country’s digitalisation drive, economic slowdown and the US-China trade war, according to the latest Hurun list.
The cut-off to make the list is a personal net worth of at least 2 billion yuan (US$281 million). Although 266 individuals fell off this year’s list, it was not as bad as the 456 who dropped off in 2018.
“The rising penetration of new technologies have had an impact on the manufacturers that were unable to follow the pace [of digitalisation],” said Rupert Hoogewerf, chairman and chief researcher of Hurun Report, which compiled the rich list. “Forty per cent of the people on the list two years ago failed to make the cut this year, the biggest drop since records began 21 years ago.”
China’s breakneck economic growth since the 1990s has seen thousands of entrepreneurs amass massive fortunes, with the number of billionaires also growing.
However, the world’s second-largest economy has hit a blip since 2018 as the gruelling trade war with the US weighs on business owners. China’s economy expanded 6.2 per cent in the second quarter of this year, the slowest growth since record-keeping started in 1992. Moreover, analysts fear that top trade negotiators from the US and China were unlikely to reach a deal soon and ease pressure on the economy.
The owners of some bricks-and-mortar companies saw their personal net worth shrink because of dwindling exports and weaker sales at home coupled with loss of market share to e-commerce firms.