Chinese cancer screening firm trebles in Hong Kong IPO debut

Hong Kong

CHINESE cancer screening biotech firm New Horizon Health more than trebled in value on its Hong Kong debut on Thursday, notching the biggest first-day rise in the city's history for initial public offerings (IPO) raising at least HK$2 billion (S$342.5 million).

New Horizon Health closed at HK$84 - up 215 per cent from the offer price of HK$26.66, which was already at the upper end of a marketed range. The biotech company raised US$263 million in the IPO.

Thursday's pop shows that the IPO frenzy that's gripped Hong Kong is intact, coming two weeks after short-video company Kuaishou Technology leaped 161 per cent in its debut - the second-best ever for an IPO over US$1 billion in the world.

Over one million Hong Kong investors put in orders worth some HK$844 billion for Qiming Venture Partners-backed New Horizon Health's IPO. That represents a subscription rate of 4,133 times - the second-highest on record after Most Kwai Chung's 2018 IPO, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

First-time share sales have had their best start to the year on record in Asia, helped by Kuaishou's mammoth offering and fuelled by markets awash with liquidity, a stock rally, as well as hordes of retail investors bidding for shares. The dizzying first-day pops as well as the flurry of IPOs by blank-cheque companies in the US have led some to warn of overheated markets. BLOOMBERG