Bizarre Things China’s Super Rich Spend their Money On

Bizarre Things China’s Super Rich Spend their Money On
Aug 21, 2013 By Bo Brennan , eChinacities.com

Some of the Chinese nouveau riche have grown bored in recent years with the normal stuff people loaded with expendable income buy; you know, things like fancy-pants bags and inflated houses and sleek sports cars made for running over poor people. Yes, China’s super rich have grown bored and they are now looking to dump their buckets of pink RMB confetti into strange new things and opportunities. Here is a list of some of the most bizarre things China’s super rich are wasting spending their money on.

1) Pigeons
The humble pigeon has inexplicably moved off the dinner tables in China and turned into a veritable, feathery gold mine. In fact, one dude even compared them to being the “Ferraris of the bird world”, because we all love a good absurd metaphor sometimes. These birds are damn pricy though and it’s due to the fact that these are no ordinary birds—they’re racing birds. It’s like horse races, presumably, but with pigeons, complete with gambling and large amounts of money changing hands. The pigeon racing business is actually quite seedy, complete with accusations of steroids and race rigging and a straight up economic pigeon bubble. Anyway, due to all this nonsense, some Chinese dude paid around 328,000 USD for a single pigeon and it’s not uncommon to peddle off your average, run-of-the-mill pigeon for 15,000 USD.

2) Crickets
Keeping with our random expensive animal theme, up next is the humble cricket. Cricket fighting has long been part of Chinese culture and in various parts of the country crickets have become the major breadwinner for some families. The demand for cricket is huge and, granted, crickets are bit cheaper than pigeons, so maybe we can only consider them the Volvo of the bug world, but that didn’t stop one dude from selling 10,000 of them at 1.50 USD a head for a glittering total of 15,000 USD. The big dogs, the Evander Holyfields of cricket fighting, can fetch upwards of 1,000 USD. China is a funny place sometimes.


Dalian billionaire Li Ruihong with his red Mastiff. Photo: yahoo.com

3) Dogs
You knew this one was coming. Certain breeds of dogs are mind-bogglingly expensive in China due to excessive demand driving up the price. One of the most expensive types of dogs is the Tibetan Mastiff (藏獒) and a precursory glance at Taobao.com puts a normal Tibetan Mastiff in the 6,000 to 22,000 RMB price range. That’s small beans though compared to the 4 million RMB (about 650,000 USD) Tibetan Mastiff that was recently sold to some loaded woman in Xi’an. Of course, the situation not being nearly absurd enough, the half-a-million dollar dog was welcomed home with a fleet of limousines and all the pomp and circumstance befitting the gravity of the situation. Meanwhile, a billionaire businessman from Dalian spent 158 million RMB on a pure red Tibetan Mastiff (pictured above) in 2012, creating a new record for most expensive dog. 

4) Walnuts
Moving from animals to food, first we have the innocuous walnut. Due to uncertainties and lack of faith in the Chinese stock markets, many of China’s super rich have been seeking alternative investment opportunities and one of them just happens to be the “Genus Juglans”. Some of the walnuts are just plain old walnuts, while others are meticulously carved and sheared into admittedly beautiful scenes. Art or not, some of the walnuts will set you back anywhere in the 3,500 to 20,000 RMB range with the swankiest, most luxurious of walnuts selling in the neighborhood of 30,000 RMB or more. That’s pretty nuts.

5) Tea
Of course, with China’s long and torrid love affair with tea, we all knew that cha was going to show up on the list. The most famous and expensive types are the ones that are only grown in special areas of the country, like Dahongpao tea that is only grown in one small backwater in Fujian Province. Again, due to the lack of trust in the Chinese stock market, demand for certain kinds of Pu’er tea cost as much as 25,000 USD for a 345g cake of compressed tea. One dude even started up a farm in Sichuan where he fertilizes the tea with panda dung and then sells it for 3,500 USD per 50 grams of the panda dung tea (I hope that’s the name of it) because you can’t physically get more Chinese culture than by combining tea and pandas. 

6) Foreign Companies
Now, I know companies are supposed to be expensive, and luxury yacht companies especially so, but it’s a remarkable trend nonetheless. Wang Jianlin, who controls the Dalian Wanda Group, recently purchased the yachting company Sunseeker International, which is most notable for appearing in a few recent James Bond film. This set Wang back a staggering $495 million dollars for 91.8% controlling stake in the boat company. In addition to purchasing the company, Wang invested 1.08 billion USD in real estate property in London to make way towards a luxury hotel and a couple of apartment complexes. It must be a tough life with all that money weighing down on you.

7) A Virgin Wife
Now, it would technically be illegal to ‘purchase’ a virgin wife, but Chinese millionaire dudes are always thinking of ways around these sorts of inconveniences. Enter reality television. Last year, a television show in Guangzhou had millionaires—or more appropriately, their lackeys—scouring lists of applicants to find a “pure” wife (or mistress perhaps). Entry into this peculiar show on the guy’s side requires them to have at least 5 million RMB to have the…um…distinction to participate on the show. The girls had some requirements, predominant among them the request that they couldn’t have knocked boots with anyone, ever. Such is the price of love.

Conclusion

There is plenty of excess cash floating around in the upper echelons of Chinese society, so there are bound to be further stories of crazy things exploding in price in the future. I would like to give some advice as to what might be next, but after everything on this list, your guess would be as good as mine.

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Keywords: china’s super rich Chinese nouveau riche

8 Comments

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Guest531648

Paying 5 million for a virgin tramp to pounce on is ridiculous. Just hit up Sanlitun bar district during the summer months to meet cute virgin cuties from europe, who haunt the trashy bars there.

Sep 09, 2013 12:25 Report Abuse

florin_suciu63

Don't be upset on the rich ones... be upset on the poor ones, they have to get to 7-10 digits bank account. Even you after that you'll see the world different... The "new richest" of China are like small kids, get to much , to fast when they are not prepared... not even their parents. That's why they need "new friends" who saw the world and have projects that can make them feel "important" . This is the difficult part...why? becose they know nothing but counting the money ... and is not their fault! I wish I have into the Club of China to help them "discover the world with all the beauties in it"!

Aug 26, 2013 13:33 Report Abuse

Guest849094

And yet these Chinese think they are "respectable" for being rich. Little do they know their behaviours are utterly disgusting.

Aug 23, 2013 08:01 Report Abuse

Vyborg

Funny they try and make us believe the beast in the picture is a dog. I saw one just like that in a zoo here in China and I'm sure it was a lion. It wasn't orange though, kind of brownish desert colour. Photoshop can work miracles, we've seen that before as well.

Aug 21, 2013 21:10 Report Abuse

sharkies

Chinese are so obsessed with money now it's disgusting. Most of the money wasted is all in the name of "face". It's ashame they can't put their money to better use by helping the community or doing something beneficial for society. The love of money is the root of all evil.

Aug 21, 2013 13:52 Report Abuse

Guest531648

I know right??? They so need a spanking!

Sep 09, 2013 12:26 Report Abuse

Corflamum

You forgot human breast milk, therapeutic hand jobs and getting the hell out of China :p

Aug 21, 2013 05:46 Report Abuse