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Friday, June 3, 2011

Singapore has world's highest proportion of millionaires


SINGAPORE: About 15.5% of the households in Singapore had more than US$1mil (RM3mil) of investable assets in 2010, the highest proportion in the world, a report said.
The latest global wealth report released by the Boston Consulting Groupshowed that the number of households with more than US$1mil assets, aside from properties occupied by the owners, grew by almost 33% from 2009, Xinhua news agency quoted local media report Thursday.
Switzerland came second with 9.9% of its households joining the millionaire club, followed by 8.9% for Qatar, 8.7% for Hong Kong and 8.5% for Kuwait.
The United States was ranked seventh at 4.5%, but has by far the largest number of millionaire households, about 5.2 million. In terms of the total number of such households, Japan was the second and China, the third.
For the world as a whole, the proportion of millionaire households was about 0.9%, but they owned about 39% of the world's wealth, up from 37% in 2009.
The Straits Times quoted an economist as saying that a number of factors contributed to the surge in the proportion of its millionaire households.
"Singaporeans saw their wealth surge because of the stronger Singapore dollar, sharp economic rebound and soaring asset prices, including property," said Chua Hak Bin, Bank of America Merrill Lyncheconomist.
"Openness to foreign talent and wealthy 'new' Singaporeans probably also expanded the number of millionaires." - Bernama

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