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Red-Hot China Job Site Helps CEO Amass a $1.5 Billion Fortune

Red-Hot China Job Site Helps CEO Amass a $1.5 Billion Fortune

(Bloomberg) -- The head of China’s hottest job site never has to work again.

Rick Yan, chief executive officer of 51job Inc., has amassed a $1.5 billion fortune, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Yan, who has never appeared on an international wealth ranking, owns 20.8 percent of the Shanghai-based company, which operates one of the country’s largest online recruiting and human resources businesses.

Its American depositary receipts -- the ticker is JOBS -- have soared more than 80 percent this year, fueled by surging revenue, which climbed 34 percent to 801 million yuan ($125 million) in the first quarter from the same period a year earlier.

“This better-than-expected top line, plus economies of scale and scope at the core of our business model, resulted in healthy profitability,” Yan said during a May 3 conference call to discuss the financial results.

Red-Hot China Job Site Helps CEO Amass a $1.5 Billion Fortune

Yan, 55, was an initial investor in 51job and joined as CEO in 2000. He previously worked at Bain & Co. for 11 years, where he set up the firm’s Hong Kong and Beijing offices, according to a biography on 51job.com. Yan received engineering and philosophy degrees from the University of Hong Kong, and an MBA from France’s Insead.

A company spokeswoman said Yan declined to comment on his net worth.

The company’s range of online recruitment and human-resources services is “compelling,” particularly as client budgets grow, Ryan Roberts, an MCM Partners analyst who has a buy rating on the stock, wrote in an April research note.

--With assistance from Gao Yuan.

To contact the reporters on this story: Lee Miller in Bangkok at lmiller@bloomberg.net;Venus Feng in Hong Kong at vfeng7@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: John Liu at jliu42@bloomberg.net, Peter Eichenbaum, Pierre Paulden

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.