Ta ma de! Remember that China is a country where a good percentage of the population still lives on $2 or less a day and the average income per years (even with purchasing power parity) is less than $8K a year, real dollars are $2K a year. Mexico by contrast has 1 billionaire and $11K (PPP) per capita, real $8K per year.


China Has 106 Billionaires, Up From 15 Last Year (Update1)
By Allen T. Cheng and Dune Lawrence






Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) — China has 106 billionaires, up from 15 last year, as surging stocks boost the wealth of the nation’s richest people, according to the Shanghai-based Hurun Report.
Yang Huiyan, the 26-year-old daughter of a property developer, is the nation’s wealthiest person with $17.5 billion, according to the annually published list. She also topped a list released by Forbes Asia two days ago.
China’s billionaire tally is second only to that of the U.S., which has 400, according to the Hurun Report, as surging mainland and Hong Kong stock markets have boosted wealth.
“China may have 200 billionaires, we just haven’t identified them yet — there are a lot of people out there who don’t report their assets,” said Rupert Hoogewerf, who has produced the list since 1999. “The new wealth we haven’t discovered yet is lying in the stock markets.”
The mainland benchmark CSI 300 Index of stocks has nearly quadrupled in the past year. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index is up 41 percent this year through yesterday, the strongest annual performance since 1999 if it holds through year-end. Mainland and Hong Kong-based companies raised HK$160.3 billion in Hong Kong this year through Sept. 30, up from HK$133.9 billion last year.
Yang’s net worth rocketed after her father gave her his shares in property developer Country Garden Holdings Co. and the company raised HK$14.8 billion ($1.91 billion) in its Hong Kong debut last April.
Nine Dragons
No. 2 on the list, Zhang Yin, saw the value of her holding in the paper-recycling company she founded, Nine Dragons Paper Holdings Ltd., triple to $10 billion since last year. She was the richest person in mainland China last year with $3.4 billion after Nine Dragons went public.


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Interesting. It was only a matter of time before China started to take over the world.

Let's see if they can beat the extremists Muslims to it. (No racism intended)

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I'm going to China anyway. I'm very shallow about money. I like it.

The number of billionaires per capita is China is still very low, which is compatible with the fact that China has low income per capita. If you want to make a mathematical comparison between the rich Chinese and average Chinese, you have to compare the total number of billionaires and the total amount of wealth China has.

It is already clear that the number of billionaires boosts this year due to the stock market. This wealth is not stable and volatile. America has 400 billionaires, which are real billionaires. Chinese billionaires can become homeless tomorrow.

There is very little doubt as to the origin of this apparently new appearance of billionaires, however unstable the financial ground upon which they stand truly is. The Chinese business elite are finally beginning to make (perhaps limited) progress in getting a firmer hold over the massive trade between their own country and its many partners, the United States in particular; or, rather, a hold on the wealth flowing out of the latter and into the former.

I think it makes more sense to compare China by the number of billionaires per capita in countries that are in its level of gdp/capita.

For instance, Mexico is wealthier than China per capita but nowhere near as many billionaires.

Well it isn't really a fair system of measuring nations. There aren't any industrialized nations with as many citizens as the U.S., giving us an unfair advantage in the "number of billionaires" department, and China has more people than most continents, giving them an unfair advantage in the "number of billionaires" department. You just have to factor those things in.

It might also be worth noting that it has no where near as many people. Comparing China to countries of it's general per capita range is almost like comparing America to Luxembourg... Just to make the point clear.

I'm sorry but you are uninformed. That is how it is always compared, just for the reason you stated.

We compare people per capita and/or per 10,000 people to norm for population differences, this is why social scientist use it.

Otherwise we would just look at gross/aggregate for everything.

We do not tend to compare living standard by saying Luxembourg, Japan, and America have X, Y, Z Gross GDP or Gross education level, because America will win every time.

We look at it broken out per capita, we look at distribution within the population, etc.

So, as I said, you need to look at per capita income and their income rage in the aggregate. I would also look at income inequality. If a nation has a flat income inequality it will generally have less billionaires, if it is strongly stratified it will have a lot more, even if the per capita income is the same.

so... I would do billionaires per 10,000 people, countries with similar income per capita, and income inequality.

I think if you did this you would still see that countries like Mexico on a ranking are more pathetic in producing wealth than China.