CICC, a Hong Kong-listed Chinese investment bank, has decided to triple the size of its A-share IPO on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, it said this week.
The firm was initially looking to issue up to 458.6m shares on the Shanghai bourse. However, the bank has decided to more than triple that number to 1.44bn shares. This will be equal to as much as 24.77% of its total shares after the offering.
The change was because the earlier plan no longer met CICC’s capital needs to grow its business, local media Caixin reported, citing a source inside the firm.
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The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has emphasised that the new national security law (NSL) for the city will not have a negative impact on its financial market. Its comments follow similar assurances from the Securities and Futures Commission and financial secretary Paul Chan last week.
The NSL will not affect HKMA’s long-established supervisory policies and regulatory guidance or its existing supervisory approach, said HKMA’s chief executive Eddie Yue in a Wednesday statement
“To put it simply, it should be business as usual for the ongoing operations of our city’s financial institutions,” Yue added. “The HKMA does not see that the NSL would affect their normal conduct of business, provided it is permissible under the existing regulatory framework.”
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Hong Kong will continue to play an important role in connecting Chinese companies with Asian and global investors. Foreign-listed Chinese companies are welcome to list in the city, Li Xiaojia, chief executive at the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX), reportedly said at a HKEX webinar this week.
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The PBoC has issued a draft rule aimed at better evaluating banks’ performance in their green finance provisions.
For the first time, the central bank will start counting green bonds — instead of just green loans — as part of banks’ green finance provisions. The PBoC will also consider banks’ green finance provision when calculating their macro-prudential assessment (MPA) score. A higher MPA score entitles banks for regulatory privileges.
Just two months ago, the PBoC, along with the National Development and Reform Commission and the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), updated the list of eligible projects for green bonds.
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The PBoC issued rules to standardise blockchain applications in finance, Caixin reported, citing a source. The rules focused on the requirements for financial applications to use blockchain technology and attempted to evaluate the design, performance and security of these applications.
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The Chinese Ministry of Finance sold Rmb5bn ($713m) of offshore renminbi bonds in Hong Kong on Thursday.
The Rmb4bn two year tranche was priced at 2.1% and was roughly 4.23 times subscribed, according to a notice on the HKMA. The Rmb1bn five year portion was sold at 2.2% and was 8.08 times subscribed.
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The monthly revenue and profit growths at Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) turned positive for the first time in 2020 in June, according to data from the Ministry of Finance.
On a year-on-year basis, total SOE revenues increased by 7.1% in June. However, the growth for the first six months of the year dropped 4.9% compared to the same period in 2019 to Rmb27.95tr. Total profits in June were 6% higher year-on-year, but first half profits of Rmb1.12tr were 38.8% lower than a year ago.
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The China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission said it plans to accelerate the development of a catastrophe insurance system in China.
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China could lower the legal ceiling for private lending rates from 24% to no more than four times the one-year loan prime rate (LPR), which currently stands at 3.85%, Caixin reported. In the case of a dispute, any loans by individuals or companies without a lending licence, with interest below the limit, will enjoy legal protection in the Chinese courts.
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State-owned fund manager China Reform Holdings, together with 31 SOEs owned by the central government, has set up a fund dedicated to mitigating the risks of central SOE bonds.
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Didi, often referred to as China’s Uber, is preparing for an IPO in Hong Kong, Caixin reported exclusively, citing a source close to the company’s top executives. The listing is not driven by the company or its chief executive, but by some of Didi’s nearly 100 investors including Japan’s SoftBank, the magazine said.
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Standard Chartered said this week it will set up a Greater Bay Area centre in Tianhe district, Guangzhou, to support the operations of retail and corporate banking in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
StanChart will invest $40m in the centre, which is expected to start operations from the third quarter of 2020. It plans to have 1,600 employees by the end of 2023.
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The China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC) issued a set of guidelines for the country’s property insurers and reinsurance companies.
The new regulation seeks to decentralise the oversight of the insurance industry and allocate this power to local authorities, according to the guideline. The national-level CBIRC will only oversee large players with nationwide services.
The changes will ensure better allocation of regulatory resources and enhance coordination between local and national regulators, the CBIRC said in the statement.
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The Shanghai Stock Exchange released the new SSE Star 50 Index on Thursday. The index tracks the top 50 stocks in terms of daily average market value on the bourse’s Nasdaq-style Star board.
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The CSRC has finalised the penalties for GF Securities relating to its involvement in various capital markets transactions between 2014 and 2018 for Kangmei Pharmaceutical Co, a company accused of committing financial fraud.
In addition to the previously announced ban on IPO sponsorship and bond underwriting for six and 12 months, respectively, eight of GF’s bankers were banned from either the IPO or the bond markets for 10 to 20 years. Six others were ordered to have a ‘regulatory talk’ with the CSRC – a type of measures for violations – including one banker who will also be publicly condemned.
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Onshore securities houses underwrote nearly 49% more local government bonds for the first six months of 2020 versus a year ago, according to data from the Securities Association of China.