Hong Kong's highest paid actors and actresses revealed

HONG KONG - As 2013 is quickly coming to an end, over 200 artists were seen at the annual TVB Sales Presentation in promoting dramas for the upcoming year. During the programme presentation, many actresses wore low-cut dresses in order to catch the eye of sponsors.

And while it was revealed that many artists' compensation for functions and events dropped, Linda Chung managed to surpass Myolie Wu in commercial value. Riding on the potential TV Queen momentum, Linda's show price doubled from $60,000 HKD (S$9700) to $120,000 HKD (S$19,000), reports Popular Asians.

Although TVB's current favorites, Myolie and Kate Tsui are right behind Linda in earnings, coming in at $100,000 HKD (S$16,000) and $80,000 HKD (S$12,900) per show respectively - the most notable actress they should look out for is Eliza Sam.

Within three years, the goddess more than tripled her earnings and is currently reaping in $70,000 HKD (S$11,300) per job. Surprisingly, Christine Kuo did not even make the list, evidently having been affected by her recent overweight predicament.

Sire Ma, who originally would have made the list, drastically received a drop in compensation due to her exposed lesbian scandal with Wang Ziqi. Along with Sire, many of TVB's rumour magnets and actresses who mostly rely on sex appeal, such as Samantha Ko, Koni Lui, Whitney Hui, and Tracy Ip were all replaced with fresher faces like Rebecca Zhu, Jacqueline Wong, and Tracy Chu.

While Linda is considered the top female earner, her salary per appearance does not even stand close to what Moses Chan receives. In first place, his sky-high price is at $200,000 HKD (S$32,200) per event, closely followed by Raymond Lam at $180,000 HKD (S$29,000) and Kevin Cheng at $160,000 HKD (S$25,800).

Ruco Chan managed to make the cut this year after his dramatic performance in Brother's Keeper, earning $100,000 HKD (S$16,100) per event. Having been in the industry for over 18 years, his continual hard work finally caught the eye of many companies.

Rising fast after his well-received work from Tiger Cubs and L'Escargot Oscar Leung proved his worth as he came in tenth place.

There are a number of new faces on the list of top-earning artists. It seems as though the current trend to successful self-selling is by possessing a clean and goddess-like image, as nearly half of the actresses fall into this category.

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