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Top 10 Richest Chinese People

Jack Ma by Foundations World Economic Forum from

There are presently 878 billionaires in the nation, compared to none in 2003. A glance into the lives of the Top 10 reveals a cross-section of the industries and people that are driving China’s economic growth. These ten individuals possess outstanding attributes, such as assertiveness, determination, and courage, and are prepared to forego solid employment (which is extremely valued in Chinese society) in order to go into uncharted seas.

It’s unlikely that many billionaires in the United States now have the same “rags to riches” tale as those who studied by kerosene lights or worked cleaning sewage drains to get ahead. Who are these individuals?

Take a look at the next ten people, whose combined net worth exceeds the GDPs of more than 160 countries.

1. Jack Ma (马云 Mǎ Yún) (Net worth $58.8 billion)

Jack Ma photo by JD Lasica-

China’s richest man and most well-known billionaire is a skinny, five-foot-tall tech rock star who wears traditional Chinese clothes and shows off his tai chi skills. He’s topped the Hurun List for three years in a straight, with a net worth of $58.8 billion thanks to the hard work of his online behemoths Alibaba, Taobao, and AliPay.

Ma was born in Hangzhou in 1964, the middle child of impoverished musicians. He wasn’t particularly bright in school, scoring only 1 out of 120 on a university entrance exam. He attempted three times and passed the third (although at Hangzhou’s poorest university), having learnt English by riding his bike to the nearby international hotel at 5 a.m. every morning and touring visitors around the city in exchange for English lessons.

It was because of his confidence, adaptability, and tenacity that he was able to keep going despite being repeatedly turned down for jobs, even at KFC. Despite the failure of two prior search engine start-ups, it inspired him to keep going. When Alibaba began in 1999, he got Goldman Sachs to invest (the new search engine buying up the shares of every firm that listed with them and putting it all in a garage to bolster people’s trust). It was so important to maintain staff confidence and enthusiasm that they were forced to do handstands during breaks to keep the blood flowing.

Education isn’t everything to him. “I’m the CEO of one of China’s, if not the world’s, largest eCommerce firms, yet I know nothing about computers,” he admitted in 2014. He knows what he knows because he spent three years attempting to persuade Chinese corporations to hire him to develop websites for them, despite the fact that the internet was a craze at the time. He subsequently stated, “I was handled like a con guy.”

2. Mǎ Huàténg 马化腾  (Net worth $57.4 billion)

Pony Ma by TechCrunch-

Tencent and Alibaba, China’s two digital giants, have a well-documented rivalry. Both companies compete for consumers with their payment, gaming, and eCommerce applications. The two Mas, on the other hand, could not be more unlike. Tencent CEO Ma Huateng (Pony Ma) is more reserved than Jack Ma. He wants to keep interviews focused on his job and ideals, thus little is known about his personal life.

Ma has a deep interest in astronomy as a result of his parents gifting him books on the topic when he was a youngster, and his firm is now investing in future space-age start-up concepts.

WeChat’s founder also served as a delegate to China’s 12th People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). “A lot of individuals think they can speak out and be reckless,” he has claimed. That, I believe, is incorrect… In terms of information security, we are a strong supporter of the government.”

3. Zhōng Shǎnshǎn 钟睒睒  (Net worth $53.7 billion)

Nongfu Spring Water Bottles by WhisperToMe from

It’s no wonder that China’s bottled water business is booming, given the country’s questionable tap water quality. Nongfu Spring’s red-capped bottles are ubiquitous at corner stores, workplaces, and restaurants, but the brand has now expanded into coffee, juice, and sports drinks, all of which are controlled by Zhong Shanshan.

The beverage tycoon was born in Hangzhou in 1954 and dropped out of school at the age of 12 when his intellectual parents were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution. He worked on construction sites with tattered fabric shoes until 1977, when he enrolled at Zhejiang Radio and Television University.

After that, he worked as a writer, mushroom vendor, and erectile dysfunction medication peddler before starting Nongfu in 1996. Zhong has had his fair share of hits, including charges from the Beijing Times in 2013 that his water was inferior to tap water. He is known as the “lone wolf” for his lack of connection with his billionaire colleagues and his reclusive lifestyle. But, owing to Nongfu’s initial public offering (IPO), he’s now in the top three. Having a vaccine firm (Beijing Wantai Biological) can also aid during a pandemic.

4. Wáng Wèi 王卫 (Net worth $35.3 billion)

SF Express Taiwan KPA by Solomon203 from

SF Express began with six smugglers in a minivan and has grown to become one of China’s largest delivery enterprises. Wang Wei, a reclusive Shenzhen millionaire, is the owner of this enterprise.

Wang was born in Shanghai in 1970 to a Russian language translator and a university professor. When he was seven years old, the family moved to Hong Kong, but Chinese degrees were useless over the border, leaving the family poor. Wang chose to work as a labourer with his uncle rather than attend university.

Later, in Foshan, he established a printing and dyeing firm. Wang became dissatisfied with the delays in getting samples into Hong Kong, so he began sneaking shipments across the border. Friends would request that he accept their items as well. In 1993, he founded Shunfeng Express, a company that illegally transports items across the border.

He’s renowned for being obsessive about improving his brand’s quality (an obsession, according to the South China Morning Post) and taking care of his employees – he allegedly told them, “I know the taste of being poor, of being discriminated against by others for being poor.” He had a driver slapped by a sports car driver after an accident ring the opening bell when his firm launched its IPO in 2017.

His company has benefited from pandemics. During the 2003 SARS outbreak, airline fares plunged, allowing him to negotiate with a desperate Yangtze River Express (now Suparna Airlines) to be the first courier firm in China to charter planes. His fortune has doubled in this similarly isolated year, propelling him into the top ten.

5. Xǔ Jiāyìn 许家印  (Net worth $34.6 billion)

Evergrande group by Evergrand website from

Xu Jiayin is the chairman of the Guangzhou-based Evergrande Group, which is one of the country’s leading property developers. His mother died when he was just 8 months old, so he was raised by his grandmother and father in rural Henan (a retired soldier). He worked as a security guard (for the community animals), shifted lime between cities for a pittance, and shovelled dung after high school.

Xu attempted to pass the national college admission test twice when it was revived in 1977. According to an article he published about his youth, he once had to dwell in a shack with a -15 C wind blowing through a broken window because the training school was so packed. He was typically the one to volunteer to maintain the sewage flow clear in the college latrines, having studied metalwork at the Wuhan Institute of Iron and Steel. He survived on 10 yuan ($1.40) a month, attending lectures and eating nothing but sweet potato and rotten buns. His favourite dish, he maintains, is still inexpensive dry noodles.

He worked his way up from working in metal manufacturing to being a property magnate in Guangzhou, where he is the proud owner of a football club and a volleyball team (both of which are coached by none other than Láng Png).

He doesn’t, however, appear to have forgotten his roots. In 1999, he gave his former town 1 million yuan ($152,000) and asked them to establish a school.

6. Hé Xiǎngjiàn 何享健  (Net worth $33.1 billion)

Because of the desire of He Xiangjian, principal shareholder of Midea Group, a fifth of China’s home appliances were formerly manufactured in Beijiao, Guangdong.

In 1942, he was born. He never went to university and instead worked as a farmer after graduating from high school. He opened a shabby plastics plant in the town in 1968, which was unlawful at the time since it was outside the planned system. Workers couldn’t see through the heavy smoke of kerosene lamps, which were used to melt and form the plastic.

In the 1980s, the firm was finally ready to go public. He was inspired by appliances brought back from Hong Kong and Macao, and he resolved to improve the factory, first with fans, then with air conditioning. Over the course of the decade, the demand for consumer products soared.

Today, the corporation is expanding into robots, eager to lead the way into the future. He Xianjian is another hermit who made headlines after a high-profile break-in to his Foshan house by guys armed with explosives attempting to abduct him. He’s also the first CEO of a firm worth 100 billion yuan to choose someone other than his son as chairman, opting for a protégé named Fang Hóngb.

7. Yáng Huìyán 杨惠妍  (Net worth $33.1 billion)

China’s richest lady is also the only non-self-made billionaire in Hurun’s Top 10. Yang, who was born in Guangdong in 1981, is the second daughter of Yáng Guóqiáng, who rose from farming to become the founder of Country Garden, one of China’s largest real estate companies.

Yang Sr. began grooming his daughter to be his successor when she was a little girl, taking her to board meetings and sending her to study in America. She went back to work as a buying manager as soon as she got home. She was elevated to the executive director within a year.

Yang Sr. began grooming his daughter to be his successor when she was a little girl, taking her to board meetings and sending her to study in America. She went back to work as a buying manager as soon as she got home. She was elevated to the executive director within a year.

She’s been dubbed “the girl next door” by her coworkers since she smiles a lot but rarely talks. Her ability to manage the firm through the volatility of the global financial crisis of 2008 has proven her to be a capable CEO. Her true desire, according to one Chinese report, was to become a teacher. Perhaps this is why she is the CEO of Bright Scholar Education Holdings, China’s largest bilingual K-12 school operator.

8. Dīng Lěi 丁磊  (Net worth $32.4 billion)

Ding, who was born in Zhejiang in 1971, began manufacturing and assembling radios when he was 16 years old, with the goal of becoming an engineer. He was poring through IT manuals and learning how to code by the time he came to the Chengdu Institute of Radio Engineering — not a terrific student, but always eager to put up his ideas.

He abandoned a good career at China Telecom (against his family’s wishes) in 1995 because he was confident the internet will become a big element of Chinese life. NetEase rose to prominence as a result of its free multilingual email service but faced losses in 2001 as a result of misleading income reports. During the pandemonium of SARS, however, millions of people resorted to his mobile games and messaging services, ensuring his riches.

NetEase isn’t as large a digital fish as Tencent, but it was one of China’s biggest online firms in the early 2000s, with its games (including the best-selling Fantasy Westward Journey) earning its founder Ding Lei the country’s richest man in 2003. Ding is still doing well for himself, having just purchased an L.A. property that originally belonged to Elon Musk.

9. Colin Huáng Zhēng 黄峥  (Net worth $32.4 billion)

In China, Pinduoduo has a mixed reputation. Some describe it as a site that sells subpar items and does everything it can to lure users into addicts through its combination of games and commerce. Small companies in lower-tier cities see the platform as a great way to get things at a discount.

In any case, it’s a remarkable success story in the realm of Chinese eCommerce, prospering despite Alibaba’s dominance. Huang Zheng, a 40-year-old IT wiz born to factory workers on the fringes of Jack Ma’s Hangzhou region, is the brains behind it.

Despite out-earning his parents even as an intern, he rejected a job offer from Microsoft, thinking instead that Google appeared more potential. In 2006, he returned to China with a group of Google personnel who were attempting to establish themselves as China’s leading search engine.

Huang resented the company’s strict micromanagement and departed a year later, launching a series of businesses until coming up with the concept for a substantially discounted goods app (the price is lowered if you get friends to chip in). Thanks to a locked-down populace concentrated on online gaming and shopping, his fortune increased by 63 percent this year.

10. Qín Yīnglín 秦英林 and Qián Yīng 钱瑛  (Net worth $29.4 billion)

Two pig farmers from Henan, who both sit on the board of Muyuan Foodstuff Company, one of the largest pig-breeding firms in the world’s largest national pork market, and are majority shareholders, bring up the rear. Agricultural employment isn’t very prominent in China, but because of the market disruption caused by swine flu and COVID, the pair has risen to the top of the rich list in the last two years.

Qin Yinglin grew up in poverty from the late 1960s to the early 1970s, but his parents encouraged him to attend university during the 1980s Reform and Opening Up period. He and Qian met at the animal husbandry unit of Nanyang City, where they both had “iron rice bowl” positions (a phrase signifying lifetime state employment, which was highly prized at the time). Surprisingly, they chose to return to the countryside and start a breeding farm.

They make effective use of their information. Their sties were home to 10 million piglets 20 years after they started with just 22 piglets in 1992.