• Home
  • Interviews
  • Business Wisdom
  • Tech & Business
  • Business News
  • Economy
  • Community
  • Login
ValiantCEO
  • Home
  • Interviews
  • Business Wisdom
  • Tech & Business
  • Business News
  • Economy
  • Community
No Result
View All Result
ValiantCEO
  • Home
  • Interviews
  • Business Wisdom
  • Tech & Business
  • Business News
  • Economy
  • Community
No Result
View All Result
valiant
No Result
View All Result

China halts $37bn Ant Group IPO, citing ‘major issues’

Sydney Perez by Sydney Perez
May 4, 2021
in Business News
China halts $37bn Ant Group IPO, citing ‘major issues’

China has suspended the $37bn listing of Ant Group, which had been set to become the world’s largest IPO, one day after regulators had grilled Jack Ma, who founded the company.

China’s largest financial technology company was set to list on Thursday in Shanghai and Hong Kong in a record-breaking IPO that had attracted huge interest from institutions and smaller investors.

The Shanghai Stock Exchange said in a statement that Mr Ma, who also founded Alibaba, had been called in for “supervisory interviews”. There had been “other major issues”, including changes in “the financial technology regulatory environment”, the stock exchange said.

“This material event may cause your company to fail to meet the issuance and listing conditions or information disclosure requirements,” it added. “Our exchange has decided to postpone the listing of your company.”

I’ve never seen an IPO suspended at this stage

The exchange told Ant and its underwriters, which include Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and China International Capital Corp, among others, to release the news about the suspension.

Ant was founded by Mr Ma in 2004 as Alipay, an arm of Alibaba, and was spun out as Ant in 2014. Since then its payments business has become the largest in the world, outstripping Visa and Mastercard as it processed $17tn of transactions in the year to June.

Ant said in a statement that its Hong Kong share offer had also been suspended because “material matters relating to the regulatory interview” of Mr Ma and other executives.

It added that investors would be refunded “application monies” relating to the IPO.

One broker in Hong Kong said the suspension would cause “quite profound” damage for retail investors. “I’ve never seen an IPO suspended at this stage,” said a director at one Shanghai-based brokerage, who suggested it was a “very last-minute thing”.

“It’s in no one’s interest to cancel the [completed share] allocations at this stage,” the director said. “I don’t think there’s any precedent for this type of situation.”

Recommended

 

Alibaba

 

Shares in Alibaba, the Chinese ecommerce group which owns a 33 per cent stake in Ant, were down as much as 9 per cent in early trading in New York. A spokesperson for the company said it would be “proactive in supporting Ant Group to adapt to and embrace the evolving regulatory framework”.

Ant apologised to investors and said it would “keep in close communications with the Shanghai Stock Exchange and relevant regulators . . . with respect to further developments of our offering and listing process”.

At the end of October, Mr Ma criticised China’s state-owned banks at a financial summit in Shanghai. Mr Ma suggested the big lenders had a “pawnshop mentality” and that Ant was playing an important role in extending credit to innovative but collateral-poor companies and individuals.

Recommended

 

People’s Bank of China

 

Mr Ma, together with Eric Jing and Simon Hu, Ant’s chairman and chief executive, on Monday were interviewed by the People’s Bank of China, as well as the country’s banking, securities and foreign exchange regulators. Ant subsequently said it would “implement the meeting opinions in depth”.

Guo Wuping, an official at the banking regulator, advocated greater regulation of Ant and other financial technology companies in an opinion piece for state media on Monday, noting their consumer lending products charged higher fees than credit cards issued by banks.

Mr Guo said fintech companies often lured young people into overspending so that “some people in low income groups and young people fall deep into debt traps”.

The PBoC and China’s banking regulator jointly released new draft regulations on online lending on Monday, which will oblige Ant to cap loans at either Rmb300,000 ($44,843) or one-third of a borrower’s annual pay, whichever is lower. The rules could also make issuing loans across the country’s provinces harder and analysts say they may dent Ant’s bottom line.

Tags: business news
Previous Post

Azure Cosmos DB goes serverless

Next Post

Meet Jim Miller, Former Rockstar Turned Accounting Business Leader

Sydney Perez

Sydney Perez

Sydney Perez lives in Ontario, New York. She describes herself as an explorer. Lifelong pop culture fanatic. Social media aficionado. Travel scholar. Creator. Internet specialist."Her passion about writing is her profession.

Next Post
Meet Jim Miller, Former Rockstar Turned Accounting Business Leader

Meet Jim Miller, Former Rockstar Turned Accounting Business Leader

Please login to join discussion
Everything You Need To Know About Andrew Tate: Former Kickboxer Who Claims He Owns The Internet
Business Moguls

Everything You Need To Know About Andrew Tate: Former Kickboxer Who Claims He Owns The Internet

by Gerard Palmer
August 12, 2022
0

Andrew Tate is an American-British kickboxer and internet personality. He is well-known for his controversial comments and views on women/relationships....

Read more
Outsourcing Payment Processing

The Benefits of Outsourcing Payment Processing for Businesses

August 12, 2022
Website design

Top 10 Best Website Design Trends in 2022-2023

August 12, 2022
Greatest Inventions

The Greatest Inventions Of The Last 15 Years

August 12, 2022
Why Micro Businesses Should Outsource Blog Writing

Why Micro Businesses Should Outsource Blog Writing

August 12, 2022

Valiant CEOs & Entrepreneurs Share, Inspire, and Celebrate Outrageously Successful Ethical Businesses and their Leaders.

Contact Us

staff@valiantceo.com

Follow Us

Browse by Category

  • Business News
  • Business Wisdom
  • Interviews
  • Community
  • Tech & Business
  • Economy

Links

  • About us
  • Cookie Policy
  • Editorial Policy
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
  • VIP Author

Recent News

Everything You Need To Know About Andrew Tate: Former Kickboxer Who Claims He Owns The Internet

Everything You Need To Know About Andrew Tate: Former Kickboxer Who Claims He Owns The Internet

August 12, 2022
Outsourcing Payment Processing

The Benefits of Outsourcing Payment Processing for Businesses

August 12, 2022

© 2021 ValiantCEO - All rights reserved

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Interviews
  • Business Wisdom
  • Tech & Business
  • Business News
  • Economy
  • Community

© 2021 valiantceo

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In