After going the entire week without a major IPO story, 3 major developments are showing there’s still some life in the market despite earlier signs of stumbling. At the top of the news is online recruiting site Zhaopin (NYSE: ZPIN), which has just posted a nice trading debut after a solid pricing for its new American Depositary Shares (ADSs). Meantime, video sharing site Xunlei is steaming ahead with its own listing by formally setting a price range for its shares, which means a final pricing and trading debut are likely next week. Last but not least there’s restaurant ratings site Dianping, which has formally hired investment banks for a new mega offering to raise up to $1 billion. Read Full Post…
Tag Archives: Goldman Sachs
Japan’s Line, Microsoft Xbox Move Into China
After years of hovering at the edge of China’s gadget and app markets, Japanese mobile instant messaging giant Line and Microsoft’s (Nasdaq: MSFT) Xbox gaming console are both reportedly preparing to enter the market. Line’s plan looks the most exciting to me, as the product has quickly gained a major following in Asia and could find a receptive audience in China with its new partnership. Meantime, I’m less optimistic about Xbox, as its China entry comes after its consoles have been available on the local gray market for years, and it will face competition from a new group of homegrown products. Its choice of the struggling Shanghai Media Group (SMG) as its partner also doesn’t look too exciting to me. Read Full Post…
Alibaba Changes IPO Course, Heads For NY
All my previous predictions that e-commerce leader Alibaba would ultimately make its mega IPO in Hong Kong were wrong, with word that the company is now firmly fixed on New York for its highly anticipated share sale. In my defense, I should say that a huge surge in positive sentiment over the last 5 months towards China Internet stocks on Wall Street undoubtedly helped to change Alibaba’s mind. The company had previously stated on numerous occasions that Hong Kong was the preferred venue for its blockbuster IPO, which reports are now saying could raise up to $15 billion, making it the world’s biggest Internet offering since Facebook (Nasdaq; FB) raised $16 billion in 2012. Read Full Post…
Sina Weibo IPO Plan Fails To Excite
Leading web portal Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) is rushing ahead with plans to separately list its Weibo microblogging unit, with word that it’s taken the first major step towards a New York IPO by formally hiring investment banks for the deal. I’ve previously said Sina was likely to accelerate its listing plan, amid growing signs that Weibo’s growth was slowing and users were abandoning the service in favor of Tencent’s (HKEx: 700) more mobile-friendly WeChat. The latest quarterly earnings report just out from Sina adds further reason for pessimism about the upcoming IPO, showing Weibo remains highly dependent on advertising for most of its revenue. Read Full Post…
Jumei Eyes $600 Mln IPO, JD’s Liu Eyes Rich List
The pace of new Internet IPOs coming out of China continues to build up steam, with word that yet another e-commerce company has hired investment banks for a mega offering to raise up to $600 million. The move by Jumei.com, an online seller of cosmetics, comes just a week after JD.com, China’s second largest e-commerce firm, made its first public filing for a New York IPO to raise up to $1.5 billion. A new separate report is now saying that JD.com founder and chief executive Liu Qiangdong could enter the realm of China’s richest men following the offering, with his stake in the company expected to give him a net worth of up to $7 billion. Read Full Post…
IPOs: Autohome Cuts As Trading Volumes Shrivel
An interesting picture is emerging from the mini-rush of Chinese IPOs now hitting the market, as reflected by word that online car seller Autohome has cut the size of its upcoming New York offering. On the one hand, the 4 companies to launch IPOs in the last month have all seen their shares perform quite well since their trading debuts. But at the same time, the size of the offerings has been rapidly shrinking, and all have seen their trading volumes drop dramatically since their first trading days. That seems to indicate the market is filled with speculators right now, and there’s much less longer-term interest in the companies once their shares start trading. Read Full Post…
Cars: Autohome Drives Into NY, Beijing Puts On Brakes
A couple of items from China’s booming auto market are shining a spotlight on the sector’s big potential and also the looming risk of a government-led slowdown in a bid to control the nation’s worsening air quality. In the former category, online information provider Autohome has just made its first public filing for a New York IPO, becoming the latest in a sudden burst of tech firms to raise money outside China. The second news bit looks a bit more ominous, with media reporting the city of Beijing is sharply cutting its quota for new car sales in a bid to improve local air quality. That could be the first sign of a looming slowdown for national auto sales if other cities follow suit, which could easily happen. Read Full Post…
IPO Froth Builds With Meteoric Qunar Debut
Two highly successful IPOs late last week by Chinese tech firms may officially mark the arrival of spring for such offerings after a long winter. But now that spring has finally come on so strong, the new question becomes: Is an overheated summer on the way? My answer to that question is “quite possibly”, following the very strong debut last Friday for Qunar (Nasdaq: QUNR) the fast-rising online travel site that hopes to someday take on industry leader Ctrip (Nasdaq: CTRP). Qunar’s meteoric debut follows the strong opening a day earlier for online classified advertising site 58.com (NYSE: WUBA), which rose 41 percent on its first trading day. Read Full Post…
Bank Of Amercia Ends Construction Bank Marriage
A chapter in the courtship of China’s top 4 banks by western rivals is finally about to close, with word that Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) is looking to sell its remaining stake in China Construction Bank (HKEx: 939; Shanghai: 601939), China’s second largest lender. This looming divorce shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, as it’s really just the final break-up between big western banks that once held out big hopes of entering China’s banking market through tie-ups with major state-run lenders. In an interesting twist to the story, we’re actually seeing some of the big Chinese banks make their own recent international tie-ups as they look to perhaps someday challenge the big western lenders on the global stage. Read Full Post…
Temasek Provides Good Medicine For ICBC
China’s top bank got a boost from its second biggest shareholder last week when Singaporean sovereign wealth fund Temasek boosted its stake in ICBC (HKEx: 1398; Shanghai: 601398), helping to support the lender’s share price as Chinese banks faced an unprecedented liquidity crisis. This kind of buying is exactly the kind of market-oriented support that China’s banks should be getting during this ongoing crisis, as the government tries to wean them from the free handouts they traditionally depended on during the socialist era. Read Full Post…
Alibaba Risks Burnout With News Frenzy
I have to commend Alibaba founder Jack Ma for his ability to keep his company in the headlines with growing frequency lately, as he seeks to build hype in the run-up to the e-commerce leader’s massive IPO. At the same time, however, Ma runs the very real risk of media burnout if his company continues to flood the market with this steady stream of news bits, even if many of them are truly newsworthy. Read Full Post…
