Chinese real estate services firm E-House seeks up to US$727 million in Hong Kong IPO

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Zhou Xin, executive director and chairman of E-House, said the company will consider spinning off and listing other segments focusing on community services when the timing is right. Photo: Winson Wong

Published: 8:00am, 10 Jul 2018Updated: 9:18am, 10 Jul 2018

E-House (China) Enterprise Holdings, one of the country’s biggest real estate services firms, is seeking up to US$727 million in its initial public offering in Hong Kong after delisting from New York two years ago.

The company indicated a price range of HK$14.28 and HK$17.68 per share, with 322.8 million shares to be issued in total, according to a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange.

Cornerstone investors include subsidiaries of e-commerce juggernaut Alibaba Group, Chinese state-owned developer Overseas Chinese Town (Asia), and the Singapore-based property and hotel conglomerate City Developments. A company owned by Henderson Land Development’s vice-chairman Peter Lee Ka-kit is also a cornerstone investor.

Alibaba is the parent company of the South China Morning Post.

The public offering comes nearly two years after the company went private, unwinding its listing on the New York Stock Exchange in August 2016. Ahead of that delisting, the company spun-off two units to be listed separately in New York, namely Leju, which focuses on online real estate services, and Jupai, a wealth management service provider.

“The company that delisted from the United States in 2016 is not the same company that is going public now,” said Cheng Li-lan, an executive director of E-House. “We have many business segments, and a major reason for the delisting is to allow different segments to adopt different capital market strategies.”