The mainland remains dominant in the number of cities globally that have the greatest density of the uber-wealthy globally even though the economic difficulties of the past few years have started to exact a toll.
According to most figures and calculations, there are less than 3,000 billionaires worldwide. That is a pretty select slice of the planet’s population of near 8 billion.
That gives any average human a near zero chance and change (0.0000375 percent exactly) of an ephemeral glimpse of one ordering a cappuccino or latte at a local café.
Live Anywhere, Do Anything
That is unless they live in one of the world’s main urban centers. The odds, in that case, seem marginally higher, at least based on a bar chart released over the weekend by digital publisher Visual Capitalist sourced from the Hurun Global Rich List.
That might seem surprising given that they can live practically anywhere and in anything, including near-earth orbital vehicles, but the list of the top 20 cities sends a very clear message.
Among Themselves
Many billionaires prefer the confines of the famed urban conurbations of the world communing between themselves, with speckled traces of relatively lowly centimillionaires and larger swatches of multimillionaires added in here and there.
They also choose Asia. Of the top 20 cities with the most billionaires, 13 are in Asia even though New York and London have regained a foothold at the top as the first and second on the list.
Rise of India
The first surprise is possibly Mumbai, which takes third place for having the most billionaires, a fact that belies the strong growth of its economy over the past decade under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in parallel with the overtaking of China to become the world’s most populous country.
Beijing, which fell from first to fourth, shows that the manifold economic difficulties in recent years have left their trace on the country’s wealthy, but a closer look at the list also indicates how broad the liberalization of the country’s economy has been since the economic reforms under Deng Xiaoping in the late 1970s.
Still Strong
Shanghai placed fifth, followed by Shenzhen in sixth, and legacy billionaire mainstay, Hong Kong, in seventh. Hangzhou made 14th, followed by Guangzhou in 16th. That gave the country six cities in the top 20. By contrast, the US, the country with the second-most billionaires, had three cities on the list while Europe came up with a relatively paltry two, the same as India. The only entry from any other continent was from Sao Paulo, Brazil, which came in 18th with 37 billionaires.
But when we take a closer look at other noteworthy cities in the Asia Pacific region that made the list, there are a few standouts. New Delhi (9) is probably there because of the same factors that Mumbai is. Bangkok (11), Taipei (12), and Jakarta (17) make surprisingly strong showings, while Singapore (15) and Seoul (20) seem more like relative disappointments, the latter because of its emphasis on attracting family offices and its traditionally high number of millionaires.
Low Density
Still, it must be said that none of these cities are densely populated with billionaires by any means. Although New York came first, it only has 119 of them while Seoul, the last-placed on the list, coughs up a largish elementary classroom size of 31.
An interesting side note. According to Visual Capitalist, Hurun now counts Taylor Swift as a billionaire. One thing that probably is the same everywhere. She is probably the only billionaire who would be instantly noticed – and more than likely mobbed – if she tried ordering coffee at any local cafe in the cities mentioned above.
