China Magazine: Tiktok founder becomes richest Chinese for the first time

SDA

29.10.2024 - 06:47

ARCHIVE - A teenager looks at a smartphone with the Tiktok logo displayed. Photo: Hannes P Albert/dpa
ARCHIVE - A teenager looks at a smartphone with the Tiktok logo displayed. Photo: Hannes P Albert/dpa
Keystone

The founder of the social media app Tiktok has been named China's richest man for the first time. According to the new rich list published by the Shanghai-based magazine "Hurun", Zhang Yiming's fortune was estimated at 49.3 billion US dollars. According to the magazine, the 41-year-old belongs to a new generation of Chinese entrepreneurs who are more international than their predecessors.

The ByteDance Group founded by Zhang, to which Tiktok also belongs, was able to increase its global turnover by 30 percent last year. Tiktok has almost 200 million users in the USA alone. In China, Tiktok operates under the name Douyin.

Number of billionaires in China on the decline

For the first time in three years, however, entrepreneur Zhong Shanshan had to relinquish his top position in the ranking. With a fortune of 47.9 billion dollars, the 70-year-old, who among other things controls the Chinese drinking water brand Nongfu Shan, moved up to second place. Ma Huateng, founder of Chinese tech giant Tencent, came in third place with an estimated fortune of 44.4 billion dollars.

According to "Hurun", the number of super-rich people in China fell by a total of 142 last year. According to the report, there were still 753 people in the People's Republic with a fortune of at least one billion US dollars. Since the peak of 1,185 in 2021, China has lost 432 or just over a third of its billionaires. The reasons cited were the country's economic difficulties and the weak performance of the stock markets.

SDA