It seems that Wenzhou’s traders are taking a hit in Dubai. Wenzhou is a city in China’s eastern coastal province of Zhejiang. It’s famed for its entrepreneurs who make up a large share of the Chinese trading overseas. It seems that those living in Dubai dipped into the property market. As this Chinese-language article states, many started out selling hardware, home electronics, and other small consumer goods. However, they soon “fixated” on the property market and even went so far to invite their relatives back home to invest.
Now, this is familiar to observers of China. Wenzhou’s speculators are famous for teaming up and buying property across China. It seems they were doing much the same in Dubai. Except their bets haven’t paid off and they are now taking heavy losses. Dubai World’s problems have only amplified the losses and the Chinese-language media is full of similar stories.
How much have they lost? The article estimates that Wenzhou’s traders have invested up to $740 million in Dubai’s property market. The estimate assumes that half of the 10,000 traders from Wenzhou living in Dubai bought a property. It’s an impressive figure, albeit worth less today. Most famous is Hu Bin, who spent $28 million to buy “Shanghai Island”, one of 300 artificial islands made from reclaimed land and designed to look like a map of the world.
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