Starbucks Surged After Announcing It Will Open 500 New Stores In China Every Year For The Next Five Years

According to The Wall Street Journal, Starbucks Corporation SBUX's ambitions in the Chinese market is much larger than previously expected.

Starbucks' CEO Howard Schultz told WSJ that the company plans on opening 500 new stores in China every year for the next five years.

Shares of Starbucks were trading higher by more than 2.5 percent at $59.28 late Tuesday morning.

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Schultz even hinted that China will become Starbucks' largest market in the future. The company currently runs approximately 2,000 stores across 100 cities in China.

Starbucks' operates roughly 7,000 stores in the US and 14,800 stores in its Americas region, which includes the US, Canada, Brazil and Puerto Rico.

Starbucks' expansion in China comes at a time when its economy is slowing down and its stock market is highly volatile. The company doesn't breakdown its China sales, but its fourth quarter revenue for the China and Asia-Pacific segment more than doubled to $652.2 million from the same quarter a year ago.

"We have confidence in the future of the Chinese economy, despite all the rhetoric, noise and issues," Schultz told the publication, ahead of a visit to the country. "People are looking for reasons not to believe. I'm on the ground and I see firsthand. I am bullish."