File photo: IC

More entrepreneurs from emerging sectors such as advanced technology, the internet and information technology showed up on the list of China's wealthiest people this year, a report issued by Hurun Research Institute showed on Thursday.

The trend reflects a dynamic domestic economy whose drivers are shifting from traditional powerhouses to newly emerging sectors. 

In 2019, Chinese tech company Alibaba's founder Jack Ma Yun who retired as chairman in September, took the crown of China's richest man, with a fortune of $39 billion, according to the 2019 Hurun China Rich List issued by Hurun. 

Runner-up was Pony Ma Huateng, founder of Tencent in second place, with $37 billion. Evergrande's founder Xu Jiayin ranked third with wealth of $30 billion.

A total of 1,819 Chinese entrepreneurs whose wealth exceeds 2 billion yuan ($281.1 million) are on the list, down 4 percent year-on-year. This marks the second year the list has shrunk, with nearly 40 percent of the entrepreneurs dropping out of the list since last year, Rupert Hoogewerf, chairman and chief researcher of Hurun, was quoted as saying in the report sent to the Global Times.  

But Chinese individuals' presence on the list increased, with 192 new faces. In this crowd were unicorns (52 individuals, with 22 from the new STAR Board). 

A total of 19 people on this year's rich list have fortunes exceeding 100 billion yuan, the biggest jump since records began 21 years ago.

Huawei's founder Ren Zhengfei also saw his wealth grow 24 percent to $3 billion in 2019 despite US-led brutal crackdown on Chinese technology companies. Climbing up 36 spots, he now ranks No.162 on the list.  

Technology entrepreneurs are replacing those from the traditional powerhouses of manufacturing and real estate, the report showed. 

The proportion making their wealth in information technology rose to 11.7 percent from last year's 10.3 percent, surpassing investments to become the third-largest source of wealth for entrepreneurs on the list. 

Manufacturing and real estate are still the two largest sources of wealth for the list, but the combined proportion has fallen by 1.6 percentage points to 39.3%.