Asia-Pac takes lead in list of richest young entrepreneurs

Melbourne

A SHIFT is underway among the world's richest young entrepreneurs.

Six of the world's 10 wealthiest self-made billionaires age 40 and under are from the Asia-Pacific region, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Four are Chinese and two are Australian. Just three are from the US, which used to dominate the list.

When the Bloomberg Billionaires Index began in 2012 with a list of the world's 40 richest people, three were self-made and under the age of 40: Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page and Facebook Inc's Mark Zuckerberg. Mr Brin and Mr Page are too old now, but Mr Zuckerberg tops the list of the world's richest self-made youngsters with a US$65.5 billion fortune.

Joining him are Shanghai resident and e-commerce entrepreneur Colin Huang (US$13.7 billion), who rose to second from third in 2018, as well as Facebook co-founders Dustin Moskovitz (US$11.8 billion) and Eduardo Saverin, a Brazilian living in Singapore (US$9 billion).

The other Chinese billionaires to qualify are TAL Education Group founder Zhang Bangxin (US$5.5 billion), drone-maker Frank Wang (US$5.2 billion) and Bitmain Technologies co-founder Micree Zhan (US$5.2 billion).

This diversification of the world's youngest billionaires is a leading indicator of the shift in global wealth towards Asia. Of the 500 people on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index today, 41 are from China compared with 31 at the end of 2016. BLOOMBERG