The number of billionaires rose to 2,158 in 2017, Swiss banking giant UBS and consultancy PwC said in a report Friday. It showed that a total of 199 new billionaires were created over the year globally.

Their collective wealth increased by 19 percent to the staggering total of $8.9 trillion (€7.83 trillion), led by growth in China.

Nearly a third of the new billionaires gained their wealth through some form of innovation, while the rest did so by scaling up businesses in the Asia-Pacific region, the report noted.

According to the Billionaires Insight Report, "China's billionaire entrepreneurs are leading their country's economic transformation, and by extension that of the rest of Asia."

Challenging Silicon Valley

It added that over little more than a decade, they had created some of the world's largest companies, raised living standards and made fortunes at an unprecedented pace.

UBS and PwC emphasized that there were already more billionaires in Asia than in the United States, and they were on course to be wealthier than their US peers within three years.

"A new cohort of Chinese entrepreneurs is challenging Silicon Valley amid rising tensions over trade and intellectual property," the survey argued. "They are developing new business models, moving rapidly between sectors."

"Ongoing urbanization and productivity growth would help the young entrepreneurs at the forefront of China's wealth creation continue to reach the ranks of the billionaires in the coming years," the report concluded.

hg/jd (Reuters, dpa)