Explainer | A survivor’s guide for simultaneous dual listings in Hong Kong and mainland China’s markets

Name: Ant Group poised to be world’s biggest private firm making public debut, with Hong Kong-Shanghai IPO
Uploaded: 2020-10-19T22:45:21.000Z
Duration: 1 min 12 s
Description: Ant Group poised to be world’s biggest private firm making public debut, with Hong Kong-Shanghai IPO

Stitching together two different regulatory timetables is the riskiest aspect of simultaneous dual listings

What lessons can companies learn from Ant Group’s jumbo share sale in two jurisdictions at the same time?

Reading Time:5 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

More companies are expected to dual list in Hong Kong and the mainland after Ant. Photo: AFP

Enoch YiuandAlison Tudor-Ackroyd

Published: 6:45am, 20 Oct 2020Updated: 12:10pm, 20 Oct 2020

Ant Group is on course to become the world’s first company to launch a simultaneous initial public offering on Hong Kong’s main board and Shanghai’s Star Market, creating a template for other firms to follow.

Ant, which began as a payments service for e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding, won clearance from regulators on Monday to kick off marketing the Hong Kong tranche of its IPO but is still waiting for the China Securities Regulatory Commission to sign off on the listing paperwork for the Shanghai leg of the offering later this week.

In this explainer, we take a look at how the operator of China’s largest mobile payments platform by volume Alipay, is navigating the regulatory process and technical challenges of selling shares in two jurisdictions at the same time.

Co-hosting IPOs with mainland markets will help Hong Kong keep pace with the swift development of financial hubs in mainland China. Beijing is steadily opening its domestic financial markets to foreign investors and nurturing neighbouring Shenzhen as a technology and financial hub.

01:12

Ant Group poised to be world’s biggest private firm making public debut, with Hong Kong-Shanghai IPO

What is a dual listing and why does Ant need to list in two markets?

A dual listing refers to a listing of shares by a company in two markets. This is handy for larger listings as issuers can access a deeper pool of potential investors and capital. For Ant, a dual listing is key to success as its bumper IPO is set to smash the record held by Saudi Aramco’s US$29.4 billion IPO last December as the biggest share offering ever.