Tencent-backed Kuaishou’s IPO overbought 1,200 times by retail investors, sets record
- Retail tranche more than 1,200 times oversubscribed, Kuaishou’s Hong Kong IPO, topped demand for beverage giant Nongfu Spring’s IPO
- Kuaishou IPO sets final offer price at HK$115 a share, top-end of marketed range
Tencent-backed Kuaishou Technology wrapped up the first mega IPO of the year on Friday. It set the final offer price at HK$115 per share, top-end of the range, after the short video platform set a record as the most oversubscribed deal ever in Hong Kong attracting retail investors’ demand totalling HK$1.28 trillion (US$164.8 billion), according to preliminary data provided by people familiar with the transaction.
The top price has helped the loss-making company raise US$5.4 billion, the biggest IPO in 14 months since the US$13 billion raised by Alibaba Group Holding, owner of the Post, in November 2019.
Demand for Kuaishou’s shares looks set to top the scramble to buy stock in Chinese beverage giant Nongfu Spring, whose US$1.1 billion IPO last August was overbought 1,147 times.
Demand was also strong for the stock among institutional investors and underwriters had to close the book on the much larger institutional tranche two days earlier than scheduled.
