Real estate developer, Liang Shezeng joins rank of china’s billionaires

Zhuhai Real Estate developer, Liang Shezeng has joined the ranks of the world’s billionaires following gains in the share price of his Shenzhen-listed property development company, Guangdong Shirongzhaoye .

Liang, 82, injected 76% of his property business, Shirong Industrial, into publicly traded Guangdong Well Medicine Science & Technology in 2008, subsequent to which the company changed its name to Guangdong Shirongzhaoye. Shirongzhaoye mainly develops residential projects in Zhuhai in southern China’s Guangdong Province, where it is headquartered.

Shrongzhaoye this month acquired the remaining 24% stake it didn’t already own in Shirong Industrial from Liang’s son Jiarong in an all-stock transaction. Jiarong is currently the chairman of Shirongzhaoye.

Liang and son now own a combined 74% (father 54%, son 20%) of the listed company, a stake worth 7.2 billion yuan, or $1.2 billion, at Friday’s closing price of 12.75 yuan, after discounting for collateralized shares. Shirongzhaoye’s shares have doubled in the past year.

Liang entered the real estate market in 1990s, and the listed company still benefits from his relatively low-cost land bank in Zhuhai. Liang ranked No. 268 on the 2014 Forbes China Rich list with wealth of $910 million.

China, one of the world’s fastest-growing sources of new billionaires in recent years, had a record 213 members of the 2015 Forbes Billionaires List, second only to the United States.