Asia’s richest woman Yang Huiyan loses half her fortune in China property crisis

The prolonged real estate crisis in China has caused Yang Huiyan, the richest woman in Asia, to lose more than half of her wealth.

As per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Yang’s net worth decreased by more than 52% to $11.3 billion (£9.3 billion) in only one year from $23.7 billion.

Yang received the transfer of ownership from her father Yang Guoqiang, who founded the Country Garden, in 2005. Building villas, townhouses, and sizable flats were Country Garden’s first focus at a time when China’s real estate market was one of the most prosperous in the world. Two years after the developer’s IPO in 2007 came out, she became the wealthiest woman in Asia.

However, the decline in her net worth has reduced the wealth gap between her and other Chinese female billionaires, leaving Yang only $100 million short of Fan Hongwei’s riches. Fan is a manufacturer of chemical fibres and chairs Hengli Petrochemical.

Yang’s riches suffered a significant setback on Wednesday when shares of Country Garden, a firm with its headquarters in Guangdong, plummeted 15% after the company announced it would issue fresh shares to fund money.

According to CNN, the stock of Country Garden has lost more than half of its market value this year as the nation’s real estate market has struggled with declining home prices and a lack of real estate demand, which has led to a debt default crisis that has affected some of the other major developers like Country Garden since last year.

Major heavyweights like Evergrande and Sunac struggled to make payments and were forced to renegotiate with creditors as they teetered on the brink of bankruptcy in 2020 as a result of Chinese authorities cracking down on excessive debt in the real estate sector.

Buyers around the nation have started withholding mortgage payments for homes sold before completion out of anger over slow construction and delayed deliveries of their dwellings.

As experts and officials worry about financial contagion, China’s banking regulator has encouraged lenders to assist the real estate industry and satisfy the ‘reasonable financing needs’ of businesses.