Fan Hongwei becomes richest woman in China

Fan Hongwei, the chairwoman and general manager of Hengli Petrochemical Co, overtook Longfor Group's chairwoman Wu Yajun to become the richest woman in China with a wealth of $8.95 billion, Bloomberg Billionaires Index showed on Thursday.

Fan ranked 193rd on the world billionaires list, and won the 11th place in China Rich List released by Hurun Research Institute this March, along with her husband Chen Jianhua, the chairman and president of Hengli Group.

Born in 1967, Fan manages China's largest chemical fibers maker, which produces a range of polyester chips and filaments for use in packaging, electronic and pharmaceutical industries.

This Shanghai Stock Exchange-listed company saw a stock price of 16.12 yuan per share and a total market share reaching 113.5 billion yuan ($15.81 billion), as of Oct 13.

In the first half of this year, Hengli Petrochemical achieved an operating revenue of 119.16 billion yuan, increasing 13.94 percent year-on-year. 

The Suzhou-based enterprise reported revenue of 732.3 billion yuan in 2021, according to its annual report, ranking the 75th in world top 500 companies.