SHANGHAI'S Pudong ranks as the world's 38th most expensive office market with Puxi at No. 50, CB Richard Ellis, an international property adviser, said in its newly completed semi-annual global market rents survey.

London's West End, the City of London and Tokyo's Inner and Outer Central Five Wards are the top four most expensive office markets in the world, while China's Hong Kong ranked 10th, according to the survey which was released yesterday.

Connaught Place in New Delhi in India was the only new comer to the top 10 most expensive markets in the world, while Mumbai rose two places to fifth.

Midtown Manhattan was the priciest market in North America, ranking No. 21 worldwide.

The survey, which traces the office occupation costs in 176 cities worldwide, also tracks markets with the fastest growing rents over the past 12 months, the international property adviser said.

Abu Dhabi led the list of markets with the fastest growing office rents. Rents soared 103 percent over the past 12 months in the oil-rich city.

Eleven Asian cities were among the top 50 markets with fastest growing rents including four in the top 10, with Abu Dhabi, New Delhi, Singapore and Mumbai ranking No. 1, No. 2, No. 5 and No. 6 with annual growth rates of 103 percent, 79 percent, 54 percent and 45 percent, according to the survey.

In North America, fastest growing rents occurred in Edmonton, Canada where office rentals surged 60 percent while downtown New York's increased 43 percent, ranking No. 10 globally.

Of the 176 office markets monitored in the survey, 90 percent showed positive gains in the 12 months to the first quarter of 2007, CBRE said.