Hong Kong IPO: China’s Black Sesame raises US$133 million in tough market conditions
- The Wuhan-based chip designer focused on autonomous driving systems priced its shares at the bottom end of the HK$28 to HK$30.3 range, sources said
Mainland Chinese car chip designer Black Sesame International Holding has become Hong Kong’s fifth-largest listing of the year after pricing its initial public offering (IPO) at the low end of the marketed range.
The IPO, the second such listing under the city’s newly relaxed rules for specialist technology firms – Chapter 18C, has been priced at HK$28 per share, the bottom end of the HK$28 to HK$30.3 range, according to people familiar with the matter.
The firm raised HK$1.04 billion (US$133 million) from the sale of 37 million shares, surpassing QuantumPharm’s HK$989.3 million IPO, the first listing under Chapter 18C in June.
Retail investors oversubscribed Black Sesame’s offer without triggering the clawback mechanism under the listing rule, the sources said, who did not want to be identified for discussing a private matter. One of the sources said the public tranche’s oversubscription level was about two to three times, below the 10 times threshold that would have triggered the reallocation of shares.
The split between the international tranche and the Hong Kong public offering is expected to remain at 95 per cent and 5 per cent, respectively.
Retail orders were withdrawn during the IPO period after seeing star US tech stocks fall collectively, according to a source involved in the deal.
