Wee Cho Yaw is the largest shareholder and chairman emeritus of United Overseas Bank, Singapore's third-biggest lender by assets. The company has more than 500 branches and offices in 19 countries and territories. It held customer deposits of S$273 billion ($204 billion) and had assets of S$359 billion as of Dec. 31, 2017.
Wee Cho Yaw's net worth of $7.69B can buy ...
... and is equivalent to ...
The majority of Wee's fortune is derived from publicly traded United Overseas Bank, Singapore's third-biggest lender by assets. The company has more than 500 branches and offices in 19 countries and territories, according to its website. It held customer deposits of S$273 billion ($204 billion) and had assets of S$359 billion as of Dec. 31, 2017, according to its 2017 company presentation.
He owns about 18 percent of the business directly and through Singapore-based holding companies Wee Investments and CY Wee & Co, according to the United Overseas Bank's 2017 annual report.
He also holds stakes in property investor UOL Group, Tiger Balm maker Haw Par and United Overseas Insurance.
His closely held Kheng Leong Co. owns various real estate investments and property developments in Singapore, throughout Asia and in London, Sydney and Los Angeles. The business was started in 1949 as an international commodity and spice trading company. It's valued based on the average price-to-book value multiple of four publicly traded peer companies: City Developments, Bukit Sembawang Estates, Wing Tai Holdings and Ho Bee Land. Kheng Leong reported revenue of about S$778 million in 2017, according to a filing with Singapore's Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority.
He's collected almost S$4 billion in dividends through August 2018, according to company filings and an analysis of Bloomberg data. The value of his cash investments is based on these proceeds as well as stock purchases, taxes, market performance and charitable giving.
Jean Khong, a spokeswoman for UOB in Singapore, didn't respond to a request for comment on Wee's net worth.
Wee Cho Yaw was born in Quemoy, China, to Kuching-born Wee Kheng Chiang. His father founded the United Chinese Bank with six partners when Wee was seven. They initially targeted the Fujian community. Wee Cho Yaw moved with his family to Sarawak, in northeast Borneo, where he worked in the family's pepper and rubber company.
When Wee was 31, he took over his father's bank and expanded it -- enduring Singapore's separation from Malaysia in 1965, five recessions and a government-backed industry shakeout.
The billionaire charted acquisitions in Indonesia and Thailand and took over other Singapore banks in the 1970s and 1980s. In 2001, he defeated DBS, the region’s biggest bank by assets, in the S$10 billion takeover of Overseas Union Bank as the controlling family blocked a hostile bid by DBS and opted for the sale to Wee.
He stepped down as chairman of the bank in April 2013. He had anointed his son Wee Ee Cheong as chief executive officer in 2007. Hsieh Fu Hua, a former president at Temasek Holdings, succeeded the elder Wee as chairman.