Shanghai exchange prepares to list real estate investment trusts in new investment offering for public investors
- The Shanghai Stock Exchange will begin accepting applications for listing of real estate investment trusts following an official comment at Boao Forum this week
- Two applications, backed by highway-operating companies, have been submitted this week
The Shanghai Stock Exchange will allow real estate Investment trusts (Reits) to commence trading this year, part of the plan to expand the range of financial products to public investors in Asia’s largest capital market.
“We are preparing to make important efforts in Reits going forward, we are aiming for the first trial this year,” general manager Cai Jianchun said during a panel discussion at the Boao Forum in Hainan on Monday, without elaborating. The deputy chiefs of the Chinese regulators overseeing the stock market and foreign exchange were in attendance.
The exchange announced on Wednesday that it would start accepting applications for companies to issue Reits on its electronic system, with two submissions recorded on April 22, the bourse said on its website.
One was backed by investments in an expressway connecting Shanghai with the coastal city of Ningbo in eastern Zhejiang province. The other is backed by a highway in Western Chongqing municipality, it added.
The move will increase the range of the asset-backed securities valued at more than 3 trillion yuan (U$S462.3 billion). The bourse started the trading Reits restricted to private investors late last year.
Serving technology innovation had been at the top of the Shanghai exchange’s agenda, Cai said at the forum. Since its inception in 2019, 262 companies had raised a combined 340 billion yuan on Shanghai’s Science and Technology Innovation Board, also known as The Star Market, through March this year.
