Richard Li-backed insurer FWD said to postpone Hong Kong IPO: sources

FWD Group Holdings, the Asian insurer backed by billionaire Richard Li, has decided to postpone its Hong Kong initial public offering (IPO) due to market volatility, according to people familiar with the matter.

The company could resume its listing plans when market conditions become favourable again, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is private. FWD this month won approval for its Hong Kong IPO but hadn't decided when to launch the share sale, Bloomberg News has reported. The insurer was seeking to raise about US$1 billion, people familiar with the matter have said.

A representative for FWD declined to comment.

New share sales in Hong Kong almost entirely vanished in May, when only one IPO raised almost US$139 million. Listings slowed down in the city and other traditional venues as woes tied to rising inflation, hawkish central banks and the war in Ukraine impacted IPOs globally. Companies have raised about US$2.2 billion through first-time share sales in Hong Kong so far this year, a slump from US$24.4 billion from the same period in 2021, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

FWD filed an application for the first-time share sale in February after deciding to switch its listing venue to Hong Kong from the US, where it had filed for an IPO that could have raised as much as US$3 billion. The plan hit a snag amid US regulators' increasing unease over the long arm of the Chinese government after a post-IPO probe of Didi Global kicked off a wide-ranging crackdown on firms listing overseas.

Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group, China Merchants Bank International and JPMorgan Chase & Co are the joint sponsors of the Hong Kong IPO, according to a preliminary prospectus. FWD's value of new business rose 11 per cent to US$686 million in 2021, the filing shows. BLOOMBERG