US News

Communist China now second in the world for millionaires

The number of millionaire households globally jumped to 16.3 million in 2013, fueled by explosive growth in Chinese wealth, a new study says.

Asian-Pacific private wealth soared 31 percent — excluding Japan, which saw a 10 percent decline in millionaires — to $37 trillion in assets. according to a study by Boston Consulting Group.

China had 2.4 million millionaire households in 2013, a rise of 82 percent from the previous year, and was second only to the US with 7.1 million millionaire households. In North America, wealth grew by 16 percent to $50.3 trillion.

Global wealth grew by 15 percent to $152 trillion due largely to outsize gains in global equities.

“Equity markets were up huge last year and that impacted the total wealth in the world,” Brent Beardsley, a BCG senior partner and co-author of the report, said yesterday.