中國發出信號 - 結束 2 萬億美元的在美國上市推動力（1 of 2）

Recently Yahoo News on-line reported the following

China Signals End to $2 Trillion U.S. Listings Juggernaut (1 of 2)

Sofia Horta e Costa and Richard Frost

Mon., July 19, 2021, 2:14 a.m.

(Bloomberg) -- For two decades Chinese tech firms have flocked to the U.S. stock market, drawn by a friendly regulatory environment and a vast pool of capital eager to invest in one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.

Now, the juggernaut behind hundreds of companies worth $2 trillion appears stopped in its tracks.

Beijing’s July 10 announcement that almost all businesses trying to go public in another country will require approval from a newly empowered cybersecurity regulator amounts to a death knell for Chinese initial public offerings in the U.S., according to long-time industry watchers.

“It’s unlikely there will be any U.S.-listed Chinese companies in five to 10 years, other than perhaps a few big ones with secondary listings,” said Paul Gillis, a professor at Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management in Beijing.

The clampdown, triggered by Didi Global Inc.’s decision to push ahead with a New York listing despite objections from regulators, is already sending shockwaves through markets. A gauge of U.S.-traded Chinese stocks has dropped 30% from its recent high. For investors in companies that have yet to list, there’s growing uncertainty over when they may get their money back. Wall Street firms are bracing for lucrative underwriting fees to dry up, while Hong Kong is set to benefit as Chinese companies look for alternative -- and politically safer -- venues closer to home.

It’s hard to overstate the importance U.S. markets have held for Chinese firms. The first wave began selling American depositary receipts -- surrogate securities that allow investors to hold overseas shares -- in 1999. Since then more than 400 Chinese companies picked U.S. exchanges for their primary listings, raising more than $100 billion, including most of the country’s technology industry. Their stocks later benefited from one of the longest bull markets in history.

Hong Kong-based website operator China.com Corp. began the trend when it went public on the Nasdaq in 1999 during the dotcom bubble. The stock, under the symbol CHINA, surged 236% on its debut, enriching founders and backers, and showing Chinese internet firms a pathway to foreign capital -- if they could only find a way around the Communist Party’s strict regulatory controls.

Unlike companies in Hong Kong, whose laissez-faire approach to business meant there were few rules on company fund-raising, mainland-based private enterprises faced much higher hurdles. Foreign ownership in many industries, especially in the sensitive internet industry, was restricted, while an overseas listing required approval from China’s State Council, or cabinet.

To get around these obstacles, a compromise was found in the shape of a variable interest entity -- a complex corporate structure used by most ADRs including Didi and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Under a VIE, which was pioneered by now-private Sina Corp. in 2000, Chinese companies are turned into foreign firms with shares that overseas investors can buy. Legally shaky, hard to understand, this solution nonetheless proved acceptable to U.S. investors, Wall Street and the Communist Party alike.

Back in China, the government was taking steps to modernize its stock market, which only reopened in 1990, having been shut forty years earlier following the Communist revolution. In 2009, the country launched the Nasdaq-style ChiNext board in Shenzhen. Under Xi Jinping, who became president in 2013, access to the outside world was greatly increased, including exchange trading links with Hong Kong that allowed foreign investors to buy mainland equities directly. In 2018, China began a trial program to rival ADRs, but it failed to gain traction.

The most radical step came in 2019 when Shanghai opened a new stock venue called Star board, which minimized red tape, allowed unprofitable companies to list onshore for the first time, and got rid of a cap on first-day price moves. It also scrapped an unwritten valuation ceiling which forced companies to sell their shares at 23 times earnings or less. But mainland exchanges still don’t allow for dual-class shares, popular with tech firms because they give founders more voting power. Hong Kong introduced the structure in 2018.

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Translation

（彭博社）- 二十年來，受到友好監管環境, 和渴望投資於世界上增長最快的經濟體之一的龐大資金池的吸引，中國科技公司紛紛湧入美國股市。

現在，引動價值達 2 萬億美元的數百家公司背後的強大壓倒性推動力似乎停止了前進的步伐。

長期的行業觀察人士表示，北京 7 月 10 日宣布幾乎所有試圖在另一個國家上市的企業都需要得到新獲授權的網絡安全監管機構的批准，這等於敲響了中國在美國首次公開募股的喪鐘。

北京大學光華管理學院教授Paul Gilli說：“在五到十年內不太可能出現任何在美國上市的中國公司，除了一些二次上市的大公司。”

由滴滴全球公司不顧監管機構反對而決定推行紐約上市所引發的打擊行動, 已經在市場上引發了衝擊浪潮。一項測量在美國交易的中國股票的指標已從近期高點下跌 30%。對於尚未上市公司的投資者來說，他們何時能收回資金的不確定性越來越大。華爾街公司正準備面對利潤豐厚的承銷費枯竭的時刻，而香港將受益，因為中國公司正在尋找離家更近的替代場所 - 而且政治上更安全。

任何談及美國市場對中國公司的重要性的言論都不會言過其實。第一波在 1999 年開始, 出售美國存託憑證 - 允許投資者持有海外股票的替代證券。從那時起，400 多家中國公司選擇在美國交易所進行首次上市，籌集了超過 1000 億美元，其中包括該國的大部分科技行業。他們的股票後來受益於歷史上最長牛市之一。

總部位於香港的網站運營商中華網於 1999 年互聯網泡沫期間在納斯達克上市時, 開始了這一趨勢。股票代碼為 CHINA 的股票在首次亮相時飆升了 236%，使創立者和支持者致富，並向中國互聯網公司展示了一條通往外資的途徑 - 如果他們能找到一條繞過共產黨嚴格監管的方法的話。

香港公司的自由放任經營方式, 意味著公司融資沒有太多規則，不似內地民營企業面臨高得多的障礙要。外資所有權許在多行業受到限制，尤其是敏感的互聯網行業，而海外上市則需要獲得中國國務院或內閣的批准。

為了繞過這些障礙，在可變利益實體的形式中找到了變通之法 - 利用美國存託憑證(ADR) 的複雜公司結構 。大多數ADR, 包括滴滴和阿里巴巴集團控股有限公司在內正在使用它。 在可變利益實體(VIE )下 (它是由現在私有的新浪公司在2000年開創) ,中國公司變成了外國公司，擁有海外投資者可以購買的股份。儘管在法律上不太穩固、難以理解，但事實證明，這一解決方案為美國投資者、華爾街和共產黨所接受。

在中國，政府正在採取措施使其股票市場現代化。之前該市場在共產主義革命後關閉四十年, 於 1990 年才重新開放。 在2009年，國家在深圳推出了納斯達克式的創業板。在習近平於2013 年成為國家主席的領導下，對外開放的機會大大增加，包括與香港的交易所交易聯繫，允許外國投資者直接購買內地股票。 2018 年，中國開始了一項與 ADR 競爭的試驗計劃，但未能帶動發展。

最急進的一步出現在 2019 年，當時上海開設了一個名為 Starboard 的新股票交易場所，最大限度地減少了繁文縟節，首次允許無利可圖的公司在境內上市，並取消了首日價格波動的上限。它還取消了不成文的估值上限，迫使公司以23倍或更少的市盈率出售其股票。但大陸交易所仍然不允許雙重股權，這在科技公司中很受歡迎，因為它們賦予創辦人更多的投票權。香港於 2018 年引入了該結構。

(to be continued)

Note:  ADR is the acronym of American Depositary Receipt (美國存託憑證). VIE is the acronym of Variable Interest Entity (可變利益實體)