(Yicai Global) Oct. 27 -- Zhong Shanshan, founder of bottled water and beverage company Nongfu Spring, has become China’s richest man for the first time, with a personal fortune of CNY390 billion (USD61.1 billion), according to the Hurun China Rich List 2021.

Hit by falling corporate valuations, the wealth of Alibaba Group Holding’s Jack Ma, China’s richest man last year, shrank by CNY145 billion (USD22.7 billion), putting him fifth with CNY255 billion.

Zhang Yiming, the 38-year-old founder of Chinese internet giant ByteDance Technology, which owns TikTok, jumped into second place with CNY340 billion.

The personal fortune of Tencent Holdings founder Pony Ma shrank by CNY73 billion to CNY317 billion, relegating him to fourth place from second last year.

New Energy Fortunes

New energy-related industries have grown rapidly this year, creating huge personal fortunes. Zeng Weiqun, founder of battery maker Contemporary Amperex Technology, saw his wealth surge CNY200 billion to enter the top three for the first time with CNY320 billion. The 53-year-old ranked 24th last year.

The wealth of Great Wall Motors owners Wei Jianjun and Han Xuejun has grown nearly five-fold from last year, soaring CNY173 billion. With CNY218 billion, up from CNY45 billion, the couple were seventh in the rankings.

Another couple, Zhang Xinghai and Yan Min, the controllers of electric carmaker  Chongqing Sokon Industry Group, were the biggest wealth accumulators on this year’s list as their fortune surged 7.5 times from last year to CNY22 billion.

Property Tycoon Setbacks

But the real estate sector has not performed well. The top two in the realty market segment this year are Country Garden’s Yang Huiyan, 40, and 93-year-old Lee Shau-kee, founder of Henderson Land Development, ranking 11th and 15th on the list with CNY185 billion and CNY170 billion, respectively.

This is also the first time that no real estate entrepreneur has made the top 10, noted Rupert Hoogewerf, chairman and chief researcher of Hurun Report, which publishes the Hurun China Rich List.

Hui Ka Yan, the founder of real estate giant China Evergrande Group and the wealthiest Chinese entrepreneur in 2017, lost CNY162 billion, the biggest drop in wealth on this year’s list. With a CNY73 billion fortune, he crashed from fifth place last year to 70th.

Edtech Founder Upsets

For sheer scale, the biggest drop in wealth this year was for 40-year-old Zhang Bangxin, who runs the off-campus tutoring institution TAL Education Group. His fortune plunged 94 percent to CNY5.7 billion.

And the assets of Michael Yu, founder of New Oriental Education and Technology Group, shrank to CNY7.5 billion from CNY26 billion last year, while Gaotu Techedu founder Chen Xiangdong dropped out of the chart this year despite boasting a fortune of CNY80 billion last year.

For the first time this year, the Hurun China Rich List also included 197 entrepreneurs from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Among them, 106 were from Taiwan, 89 from Hong Kong and two from Macau. Thirteen of the 197 tycoons made the top 100, with Hong Kong’s 93-year-old Li Ka-shing in eighth place with a fortune of CNY215 billion.

Beijing Billionaires

In terms of geographical distribution, Shanghai is growing rapidly in contributing billionaire entrepreneurs to the list. With 78 newcomers this year, the east China metropolis ranked third with a total of 294.

Beijing remains the city with the most entrepreneurs on the list, with 341 tycoons residing in the capital, 16 more than last year.

Shenzhen was second with 301, an increase of 26 from last year. Hangzhou in Zhejiang province added 15 tycoons to the list to take fourth place with 170, while Hong Kong ranked fifth with 151, an increase of 89 from last year.

Hu Run noted that following the trend of recent years, Shanghai should overtake Shenzhen on the rich list next year for the first time in a decade.

The number of people on the Hurun China Rich List has expanded by 22 percent this year, up 520 from the 2,398 last year. And the number of entrepreneurs whose personal wealth exceeds CNY2 billion has reached 2,918, three times more than a decade ago.

The overall wealth of entrepreneurs on the list has risen 24 percent from last year’s CNY27.5 trillion (USD4.31 trillion) to CNY34 trillion, six times what it was a decade ago. There are 45 with assets above CNY100 billion this year, four more than in 2020, while none boasting such a high level of personal wealth 10 years ago.

Editor: Peter Thomas