Commodities multiply the world's wealthy

Latin America, the Middle East and Africa saw the greatest growth in the number of rich people last year as surging commodities prices and booming local stock exchanges increased the wealth of entrepreneurs and investors in emerging markets.

The number of people with liquid assets of at least $1m grew by 10 per cent or more in those three regions, according to a report by Merrill Lynch, the investment bank, and Cap Gemini, the consultancy.

The report estimates last year there were 8.7m millionaires on the planet, an increase of 6.5 per cent upon 2004. What's more, these people are becoming richer, with their total assets rising 8.5 per cent last year to an estimated $33,300bn.

Wealthy people in North America, Europe and Asia continue to account for the vast majority of the world''s millionaires. These three regions account for 8m of the global total, and 82 per cent of total wealth.

The figures reflect the effects of economic growth and rising stock markets worldwide last year, particularly growing demand for commodities. Some of these gains are likely to have been reversed in recent months after a sharp sell-off in some emerging markets as some investors switched back to less risky asset classes.

Swelling ranks of the rich have led to a scramble among the world's largest banks to capture them as clients. Growing complexity of wealth management has encouraged rich people to shift assets to large financial institutions in recent years, though even the largest players still have only a very small share of the market.

The world's rich continue to shift their money into alternative asset classes, with the proportion of wealth allocated to private equity and hedge funds rising to 20 per cent on average last year. That reflects a strong inflow into private equity, Merrill Lynch found. Lacklustre returns meant investors were less enthusiastic about hedge funds than in previous years.

一、參考譯文：

大宗商品令世界富人財富激增

拉美、中東和非洲富人的數量去年出現最大幅度的增長，原因在于大宗商品價格飚升和當地證交所交易繁榮，增加了新興市場企業主和投資者的財富。

據投資銀行美林（Merrill Lynch）和咨詢機構凱捷（Cap Gemini）報告，上述三地流動資產至少100萬美元的人數增加了10%或更多。

報告估計，去年全球共有870萬百萬富翁，比2004年增加了6.5%.并且這些人正變得更為富有，他們的總資產去年增加了8.5%，估計達到33.3萬億美元。

在世界百萬富翁中，北美、歐洲和亞洲的富人仍占絕大多數。上述三地的富人在全球總數中占800萬，擁有總財富的82%.

這些數字反映了去年世界范圍經濟增長和股市上漲的效應，尤其是大宗商品需求不斷上升產生的后果。其中部分漲幅或許在最近幾個月有所回調，因為在一些新興市場，部分投資者重新轉向風險較小的資產類別，導致急劇拋售。

日益擴大的富人階級已導致全球最大銀行之間激烈競爭，這些銀行都想招攬他們成為自己的客戶。財富管理復雜性的增大已促使富人在近些年把資產轉入大型金融機構，而一個現實是，即使是規模最大的選手，也只在財富管理市場上擁有很小的一塊份額。

全球的富人繼續把資金轉投向另類資產類別。去年，配置在私人股本和對沖基金上的財富比例平均上升到了20%.美林發現，這反映出財富強勁流入私人股本。由于對沖基金的回報乏善可陳，投資者對它們不像前幾年那樣熱情。

二、重點詞匯：

commodity n.日用品

entrepreneur n.企業家，主辦人

consultancy n.顧問（工作）

estimate v.估計，估價，評估；n.估計，估價，評估

millionaire n.百萬富翁，大富豪

sell-off n.證券的跌價switch n.開關，電閘，轉換；vt.轉換， 轉變

scramble n.爬行，攀緣，搶奪，混亂；vi.攀緣，雜亂蔓延，爭奪，拼湊，匆忙；vt.攀登，攪亂，使混雜

inflow n.流入，流入物

lackluster adj.無光澤的

enthusiastic adj.熱心的，熱情的