Pony Ma slips among richest crowd

Pony Ma Huateng, pictured, of Tencent is out of the top three on the 2022 Hurun Global Rich List for first time since 2015. He's now fourth.

Nongfu Spring founder Zhong Shanshan remains China's wealthiest person with a fortune of 455 billion yuan (HK$560.4 billion) despite a dip of 100 billion yuan in wealth last year.

Following Zhong in the money stakes is Zhang Yiming, founder of Tiktok owner ByteDance, with a net worth of 340 billion yuan. Robin Zeng Yuqun, founder of the world's largest maker of electric vehicle batteries, Contemporary Amperex Technology, ranks third with 335 billion yuan.

Pony Ma, last year's No 2, saw his wealth shrink to 330 billion yuan while one place further back is Jack Ma Yun of Alibaba with 235 billion.

Overall, China has 1,133 billionaires - the most in the world - followed by 716 in the United States and 215 in India.

And American Elon Musk of Tesla remains the world's richest person with 1.29 trillion yuan.