Booming Asia had more millionaires than Europe for the first timelast year and is fast closing in on North America for the top spot, areport released Thursday said。

　　The Asia-Pacific region was home to 3.3 million people in 2010worth $1 million or more, excluding their homes, an increase of roughly10 percent from the year before, according to the 15th annual WorldWealth Report by Merrill Lynch's wealth management division andconsultancy Capgemini。

　　Asia's growth outpaced Europe, where so-called high net worthindividuals increased 6 percent to 3.1 million, and puts it within reachof North America, where the number of wealthy rose 8.6 percent to 3.4million。

　　The report's findings illustrate how Asia's economies are growingmuch more quickly than developed countries and, in the process, mintingscores of new millionaires and billionaires. Asia's growth has beenpowered by China and India, whose economies grew 9-10 percent last yearwhile European and North American growth was in the low single digits。

　　"It is entirely conceivable that Asia would overtake North Americain the near future," said Wilson So, a managing director at MerrillLynch Global Wealth Management. "I would be surprised if that does nothappen very soon."

　　The US, Japan and Germany still account for just over half theworld's 10.9 million wealthy, while China is in fourth place with535,000, about 58,000 more than in 2009. Australia has moved up onenotch to ninth place, edging out Italy, while India cracked the top 12for the first time. It replaced Spain, which fell to 14th。

　　While 2010 was the first time that Asia has overtaken Europe inabsolute numbers of wealthy people, it is the second year that Asia'scombined wealth was bigger than Europe's。

　　The world's wealthy were worth a total of $42.7 trillion in 2010.Asia's share of that wealth amounted to $10.8 trillion, putting it insecond place for the second year in a row, just behind North America's$11.6 trillion。

　　Six of the 10 economies with the fastest growing millionairepopulations were in Asia, led by Hong Kong and Vietnam, which each sawannual growth of 33 percent. Others included Sri Lanka, Indonesia,Singapore and India。

　　本周四發(fā)布的最新報告顯示，亞洲的百萬富翁人數(shù)在2010年首次超過歐洲，與排名第一的北美差距也迅速縮小。

　　美林公司財富管理部門和凱捷咨詢公司共同發(fā)布的第15屆年度《世界財富報告》稱， 2010年，亞太地區(qū)身價百萬美元(不包括房產(chǎn))以上的富翁人數(shù)為330萬，比上一年增加了大約10%。

　　亞洲的增長超過了歐洲，與北美拉近了距離。歐洲號稱高資產(chǎn)凈值人數(shù)增加了6%，達到310萬。北美富翁人數(shù)增加了8.6%，達到340萬。

　　調(diào)查報告顯示出，亞洲經(jīng)濟體的增長速度遠(yuǎn)超發(fā)達國家，在此過程中，新涌現(xiàn)出大量的百萬富翁和億萬富翁。亞洲的經(jīng)濟增長受中國和印度推動，兩國去年經(jīng)濟增長率達到9%至10%，而歐洲和北美的增長率只是數(shù)值很低的個位數(shù)。

　　美林公司全球財富管理部門總經(jīng)理威爾遜?索爾說：“完全可以預(yù)見，亞洲富翁的人數(shù)不久將超過北美。如果總是超不過，我反而覺得奇怪。”

　　美國、日本、德國的富翁人數(shù)仍然占世界富人人數(shù)過半。中國位列第四，富翁人數(shù)為53.5萬，比2009年多出5.8萬人。澳大利亞上升了一位，排名第九，擠走了意大利。印度首次躋身前12位，取代了滑落至第14位的西班牙。

　　2010年，亞洲富翁的絕對人數(shù)首次超過歐洲，而富翁總資產(chǎn)已連續(xù)第二年超過歐洲。

　　2010年，全球富人資產(chǎn)總計42.7萬億美元。亞洲富人資產(chǎn)達到10.8萬億美元，連續(xù)第二年排名第二，僅次于北美(11.6萬億美元)。

　　百萬富翁人數(shù)增長最快的十個經(jīng)濟體中，有六個位于亞洲，中國香港和越南“領(lǐng)跑”，年增長率均為33%；其他分別為斯里蘭卡、印度尼西亞、新加坡和印度。