Chinese tour professional included in the new list of billionaires of China

Many Chinese tour service professionals have been included in China’s new list of billionaires. Feng Bin, 55, chairman of Beijing UTour International Travel Service has been declared as the new billionaire in the tourism service company.

According to Forbes, Feng owns 32% of UTour, a stake worth $1.2 billion at the closing price on 25th May, 2015 for 108.88 yuan.

UTour’s shares have gained more than 300% in the past year amid a boom in China’s travel industry. Other Chinese billionaires with industry ties include Neil Shen, a co-founder of online travel site Ctrip, and Wang Zhenhua, founder of mainland budget carrier Spring Air.

In the first quarter UTour’s revenue went up hugely by 56 per cent to 1.1 billion yuan or $177 million. The company announced a private placement plan last week to raise as much as 2.8 billion yuan, or $451.6 million by issuing 53 million new shares at 52.7 yuan for its latest acquisition.

In the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in January last year, UTour raised 337.5 million Yuan or $54.4 million, from the sale of 14.6 million shares at 23.15 yuan each. Feng has been in the tourism business for the past 33 years.