Last decent shot at making 680% on China IPOs

Shanghai

WHAT once looked like long odds of securing shares in Chinese initial public offerings now look too good to pass up.

The final 28 IPOs under China's existing online lottery system will start taking orders as soon as this month. While chances of getting an allocation have never been stellar at about 0.6 per cent, a requirement for prospective investors to pre-fund their bids kept a cap on competition.

After this batch of deals is completed, authorities will scrap the upfront payment rule, prompting a surge in investor participation that China International Capital Corp (CICC) says will slash the odds of a winning bid to about 0.01 per cent.

Getting out in front of that flood of new orders is one reason why Pan Weiting, a 31-year-old accountant in Shanghai, is stockpiling as much as 400,000 yuan (S$88,800) to bid on the final batch of 28. "I sold some shares to get ready," Ms Pan said. "IPOs are still the b…