The founder of short video sharing app TikTok, Zhang Yiming, has become the richest man in China with an estimated fortune of $49.3 billion. This is according to a ranking of Chinese billionaires published online by the Hurun newspaper. Overall, however, the number of billionaires in China is decreasing.
Chinese billionaire
Forty-one-year-old Zhang is part of a new generation of Chinese entrepreneurs who are more internationally focused than their predecessors. The ByteDance Group, which he founded and which includes TikTok, increased its global turnover by 30 percent to $110 billion last year. Zhang will step down as CEO of ByteDance in 2021.
TikTok has nearly 200 million users in the United States alone. In China, the company operates under the name Tou-jin.
The Hurun China Rich List has been published for 26 years and has been headed by 18 people in its existence. Zhang overtook bottled water tycoon Zhong Shanshan, who dropped to second place, as his wealth fell 24 percent to $47.9 billion.
Decline of billionaires in China
Tencent founder Pony Ma came in third, while PDD Holdings founder Colin Huang dropped to fourth from last year’s third place. This is despite his discount e-commerce firms Pinduoduo and Temu continuing to show healthy revenue growth, Reuters reported.
The number of billionaires on the list fell by 142 to 753. That’s a drop of more than a third compared to 2021.
“China’s economy and stock markets have had a difficult year,” said Rupert Hoogewerf, who helped compile the rankings. He added that the most dramatic drops in asset values were seen by entrepreneurs in China’s real estate sector. In contrast, the consumer electronics sector is growing rapidly, with Xiaomi founder Lei Jun increasing the value of his assets by five billion dollars since the beginning of the year.
Source: Czech Press Office