What’s new: Private Chinese insurer Sunshine Insurance Group Co. passed a hearing for an initial public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, the HKEX said Monday.
The Beijing-based company won approval from China’s securities watchdog for its Hong Kong share sale. It was authorized to sell as many as 3.97 billion shares. Sunshine Insurance filed pre-listing documents with the Hong Kong exchange in April.
The exchange didn’t disclose the size of the IPO, but the insurer could raise about $1 billion, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Huatai International, China International Capital Corp., UBS Group AG and CCB International are joint sponsors of the deal.
The background: Founded in 2004, Sunshine Insurance operates businesses including life, health, property and casualty insurance, and asset management.
China has about 200 insurance companies, eight of which are publicly traded. In the past five years, there have been no insurance company IPOs.
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic and industry transformation, the insurance industry — especially the vast majority of life insurance companies — faces development bottlenecks, making the businesses less attractive to investors.
Contact reporter Denise Jia (huijuanjia@caixin.com) and editor Bob Simison (bob.simison@caixin.com)
Get our weekly free Must-Read newsletter.
