Big investors stand to gain from new measures taken by the Shanghai Stock Exchange to streamline applications for initial public offers (IPOs), analysts say.
Investors are now encouraged to subscribe to new shares under one trading account instead of through multiple accounts, although there is an upper limit on how much they can apply for. The limit varies from issue to issue.
Their subscription monies will also be frozen for two days instead of three from the day the IPOs are opened for public buying.
Analysts said the new measures meant investors no longer had to borrow identity cards of friends or relatives to open trading accounts just to buy more new shares.
'Investors with big money can use one account to buy more shares, although they have to buy in lots of 1,000,' Huang Hua , market research manager at Shanghai International Securities, said.
An investor will get a lottery number for each lot of 1,000 shares he applies for.