New Hong Kong stock market chief must use all her skill to get balance right
Laura Cha Shih May-lung did not get the reputation as the regulator who ‘inspects you to death’ for nothing, and now she must tackle discipline and liberalisation
Former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji recruited then Hong Kong securities regulator Laura Cha Shih May-lung to help bring order to the mainland’s unruly emerging stock markets.
Seventeen years later, she is now responsible for overseeing implementation of reforms to ensure the local bourse is the No 1 destination for mainland company listings, ahead of Shanghai, Shenzhen, Singapore and New York. Cha, 68, nominated enhancement of the city’s competitiveness as her greatest challenge after the board of directors of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing elected her as its chairman.
This reflected the greatest regret of retiring chairman Chow Chung-kong – the failure of the bourse to land the US$25 billion initial public offering of mainland e-commerce giant Alibaba, now owner of the South China Morning Post, in 2014.
Alibaba listed in New York because its dual-class share structure was not then accepted in Hong Kong under the principle of one share, one vote.
This prompted debate culminating in the introduction this week of the biggest listing reforms in 25 years, including the acceptance of applications from companies with dual-class shares, and from biotechnology firms that have no record of generating revenue and therefore would not meet the financial eligibility tests of the main board.