Why was Ant Financial cancelled?

CHINA FINANCIAL - Report 04 Nov 2020 by Michael Pettis

Special points to highlight in this issue:

• Thursday’s expected IPO of Ant Financial, dual-listed in Shanghai and Hong Kong, was suspended last night. It was an extremely visible transaction that would have been the largest IPO in history.

• While there is a lot of speculation that the decision to suspend the transaction rose on concerns that only emerged recently, in fact these concerns have been around for a much longer time. The last-minute announcement of the IPO’s suspension does not improve the reputation of Chinese financial markets for transparency and stable rules of the game.

• Ant Financial has long wanted to be seen as a technology company disrupting the financial sector. Going forward it will probably be treated as a financial-sector business. What is more, given the amount of restructuring that the regulators will require, it will probably be many months before this transaction will return to the market.

Now read on...

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