China Cinda sets IPO price at 3.58 HKD

China Cinda Asset Management Co., Ltd., which is conducting an initial public offering (IPO) in Hong Kong, said on Wednesday that it had determined its IPO price at 3.58 HK dollars (46 US cents) per share.

That is the upper limit of the price range set earlier by China Cinda, one of four giant asset managers founded by the government in 1999 to remove bad loans from China's top four lenders.

Based on the offer price, the net proceeds from the global offering of 5.32 billion H-shares are estimated to be about 18.47 billion HK dollars, assuming no exercising of the over-allotment option, the company said in a statement.

China Cinda's retail trench, accounting for 5 percent of its IPO, was 161.1 times oversubscribed, with a total of 75,382 people in Hong Kong placing orders.

Given the strong response at the public offering, Cinda reallocated 797.8 million H-shares from the international offering to the Hong Kong public offering, according to the statement.

Cinda said it had granted international underwriters the over-allotment options, or so-called greenshoe mechanism, whereby it could issue an additional 797.8 million H-shares, representing about 15 percent of its initial IPO H-share volume.

Shares of China Cinda are scheduled to begin trading on Thursday on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

The listing marked a first of its kind for state-owned Chinese financial assets management companies. Cinda was restructured as a joint stock company in June 2010 under approval by the State Council, China's cabinet.

Businesses of the firm include collecting banks' bad debts, bankruptcy management, outbound investment, securities trading, investment and financial risk counseling.

It said that the funds raised through the IPO are intended to replenish its capital, 60 percent of which will be used to develop its core business of bad asset management, with the remainder to be used as capital injection to subsidiary companies and financial investment and asset management.