The Chinese technology giant Baidu debuted on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange today with a rise of 0.8% at the open compared to its initial price per share of 252 Hong Kong dollars (32.5 dollars, 27.2 euros).
During the first bars of the session, stocks rose by 1.83% but, after 10.30 local time (02.30 GMT), their advance had fallen to 0.48%.
Baidu’s second IPO – already listed in New York – will bring it about 23.7 billion Hong Kong dollars (3.052 billion dollars, 2.559 billion euros).
However, the Hong Kong press assures that the limited progress of its first moments in the park of the former British colony is a reflection that the “fever” of the IPOs in the city has already passed.
Analysts quoted by the private South China Morning Post point out that investors are no longer as “compulsive” as when, in early February, the short video platform Kuaishou debuted and its stocks rose 38% in less than two weeks.
Kuaishou generated 1,204 times more demand than the number of shares on offer, while in the case of Baidu the figure drops to 112.
Baidu’s is the Hong Kong IPO of a Chinese company already listed abroad since that of e-commerce giant Jingdong (JD.com), which raised about $ 4.5 billion (€ 3.76 billion) in June 2020.
The company has thus become the last of the large Chinese technology companies to seek a second IPO in a market in its country due to fears that the United States may take measures such as its exclusion from the trading floors of the North American country, something that already it has happened with some companies considered affiliated with the Chinese Army.
