Vietnam, India and China see fastest growth in new millionaires
The number of US dollar millionaires grew by 22.7% in India and 20.3% in China last year as the ranks of wealthy in the Asia-Pacific region swelled to 2.8 million, according to a report Friday. Vietnam saw the fastest growth in millionaire numbers with a 24.2% increase although its overall number of high net worth individuals with assets worth over one million US dollars was just 1,200.
In 2007, China had 415,000 millionaires and India 123,000, the report said. The country with the most millionaires in the region, however, was Japan with 1.51 million, a 2.2% increase on 2006.
South Korea’s millionaire population grew by 18.9% to 118,000 while Indonesia’s grew by 16.8% to 23,000, Singapore’s by 15.3% to 77,000 and Hong Kong’s by 10.2% to 95,000.
After Japan, the countries with the slowest growth in millionaire numbers were Taiwan, up 7.8% to 71,000 and Australia, up 7.1% to 172,000.
The report by wealth management company Merrill Lynch and consulting company Capgemini found that Asia-Pacific’s growth in millionaire numbers was 6% above the global average.
The region now has five of the 10 fastest growing high net worth individual populations in the world, according to the report titled The State of Asia Pacific’s Wealth.
In 2007, the number of “super-rich” people with assets of US$30 million or more grew by 16.4% to 20,400 people in Asia-Pacific, nearly double the 8.8% global growth.
Millionaires in Hong Kong tend to be the richest with the average high net worth individual having assets of US$5.4 million, followed by China with US$5.1 million and Singapore with US$4.9 million.
In Vietnam, the average US dollar millionaire has US$4 million, in Indonesia and India US$3.6 million, in Taiwan US$3.3 million, Australia US$3.2 million and South Korea US$2.7 million.
Japan, which has more than 40% of the region’s millionaires, also has the least wealthy millionaires with each high net worth individual averaging assets of US$2.5 million last year.
The region’s millionaires had assets totalling US$9.5 trillion last year and the report predicts that figure will grow to US$13.9 trillion by 2012, growing at an average rate of 7.9%.
“While growth prospects in the near term may be compromised by the global slowdown, the long-term potential is strong,” the report concluded.
“Asia-Pacific is expected to grow faster than the 7.7% projected growth per annum through 2012. This will result in Asia-Pacific replacing Europe as the second-largest regional repository of high net worth individual wealth.”
Category: Society